Poultry exports continue to drive sales for Ukraine’s MHP

Releasing its Q3 and nine-month results ending 30 September 2018, the company revealed that the volume of its chicken meat exports rose from 52,990 tonnes (t) to 80,361t compared to last year’s Q3 results and, for the first nine months of 2018, poultry exports increased by 22% from 176,015t to 213,925t compared to the same period in 2017.

MHP said the success was driven by its strategy of geographic diversification and building up the export volumes of chicken meat across the Middle East, North Africa, the EU and Asia.

Meanwhile, MHP’s poultry sales continued to struggle in its domestic Ukraine market as sales dropped by 2% from 81,895t to 80,417t for Q3 in comparison to last year and by 3% from 243,065t to 235,290t for the nine months.

Poultry prices remained steady year-on-year, with a 2% growth for Q3 and 16% for the nine months of this year, with the latter increase driven by export price growth and decreasing sales of frozen chicken in the domestic market.

Sales of the company’s other meat processing operations, such as sausages and smoked meats, decreased by 4% for the first nine months of 2018, reaching 26,000t compared to 27,170t in the same 2017 period.

The average prices of sausages and smoked meats rose by 30%, which the company said was largely driven by increases in poultry prices.

During the second quarter of 2018, MHP completed two major infrastructure projects at its Vinnytsia poultry site, as well as starting operations at three rearing sites, and increasing capacity at its slaughterhouse.