Cobb-Vantress and Al-Watania Poultry Company sign distribution deal
Established in 1977, Al-Watania Poultry has already worked closely with Cobb Europe for more than two decades in Saudi Arabia. Since acquiring the Cobb Egypt operations more than a decade ago, Al-Watania Poultry (Egypt) has been the Cobb distributor.
Currently Al-Watania Poultry processes more than 860,000 broilers a day. However, further planned expansion will take the daily production to one-million broilers by 2020.
These expansion plans are designed to help the Kingdom’s initiative to reduce dependency on chicken meat imports and increase by 20% local chicken meat production by 2020.
Al-Watania has plans to double output of parent stock chicks to four million birds a year by 2020, through expanding its hatchery and grandparent operations in Al Jouf. It is also investing in a fleet of transporters fitted with the latest onboard environment controls, with each truck capable of holding up to 60,000 chicks for delivering to parent stock customers as far as 2,000 kilometres away.
“The Cobb500 will play a key role in our expansion program,” said Mohammad Hamed Al-Shayea, vice president of production for Al-Watania Poultry. “The Saudi Government is seeking to increase food security and is supporting domestic poultry production to reduce imports, which currently represent 55- 60% of the market.”
Mark Sams, general manager at Cobb Europe, said: “The Middle East is a crucial region for Cobb, with enormous potential for growth as a key emerging market. We are very pleased to further enhance our relationship with Al-Watania, which stretches back over many years. This new distribution agreement allows us to enhance our services to customers in the Middle East, reducing transportation time and providing security of supply of parent stock chicks.”
Al-Watania explained its decision to further its relationship with Cobb was influenced by the breed’s low cost of production for chicken meat. “Al-Watania has benefited from the wide-ranging technical support teams that Cobb provides to advise on all aspects of production through its world-leading poultry experts. Currently, Al-Watania Poultry is seeing their best-ever Cobb broiler performances.”
Mohammad Hamed Al-Shayea added: “We at Al-Watania Poultry express our thanks to Mohammed Chail, Cobb sales and business development manager, who has been instrumental in business development in the Middle East for the past 30 years. Today Al-Watania and Cobb-Vantress are like one family with the purpose of serving the Saudi broiler industry, enabling local Saudi production to grow further and fulfil chicken meat demand at an affordable price.”
