Meat prices during the long week are at the same levels as last year, the President of the Cyprus Butchers' Association, Costas Livadiotis, told CNA, who at the same time stated that there is a sufficient supply of meat in the domestic market.
Specifically, Mr. Livadiotis said that while it seemed that the price would be driven higher due to foot-and-mouth disease and the culling of animals, this stopped as a result of the progress made in dealing with the disease, resulting in each shepherd wanting to sell his animals, increasing the supply of meat.
"Despite the killing of animals due to foot-and-mouth disease, there is still meat on the domestic market," he noted.
The problem, according to Mr. Livadiotis, is in the transport of animals for slaughter as it is prohibited, due to the restrictive measures for foot-and-mouth disease, for livestock traders to move on the same day from one pen to another to pick up animals or from supervised areas to unsupervised ones.
He explained that this forces the livestock dealer to delay several days in order to collect the amount of meat he needs as there are no lambs accumulated in just one pen.
The President of the Butchers said that there are three days left until Easter to slaughter animals and added that around 6.000 - 7.000 animals have been slaughtered in recent days.
Source: KYPE
