Agriculture Undersecretary Deogracias Victor Savellano lauded San Miguel Corp. president and chief executive Ramon Ang for helping sharpen the country’s competitive edge and continuing to show the way forward with the inauguration of the Magnolia Mega Farm in Hagonoy, Davao del Sur.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. attended the inaugural rites as guest of honor and led the unveiling of the San Miguel Foods marker in the facility.
“Coinciding with the celebration of National Livestock and Poultry Month this October and acknowledging the efforts of partner stakeholders in the livestock and poultry industry, San Miguel Corp., through its subsidiary San Miguel Foods Inc., inaugurated the Magnolia Mega Farm in Davao del Sur which is first among 11 mega farms that SMC intends to build throughout the country,” said Savellano.
Savellano, who oversees the livestock, bamboo and tobacco sectors at DA, said SMC’s Magnolia Mega Farm is a major step toward food security, pointing out that the affordability of chicken meat over other animal meat has contributed to the increase in its demand.
“We proudly inaugurate our Magnolia Poultry Farm in Davao del Sur, the largest in the Philippines and the first of mega farms that we will build across the country,” Ang said in his message.
“This facility will enable us to contribute to the country’s food security by modernizing poultry production, supporting local communities, and promoting ethical and sustainable farming practices,” he said.
San Miguel Foods Inc. is one of the integrators in the country with its chicken products bearing the Magnolia brand.
Citing the Philippine Poultry Broiler Industry Roadmap 2022-2040, Savellano said the chicken broiler (and egg production) industry is the most progressive animal enterprise in the Philippines today.
The roadmap also stated that in the past two decades, the volume of production doubled from around a million metric tons (MMT) in 2000 to almost 2 MMT in 2020. The volume of production was at 1.93 MMT in 2019, while the gross value of chicken production at current prices was P173.94 billion in earnings and P179.21 billion in receipts.
Meanwhile, the Philippine Statistics Authority in its Special Release in August 2023 on Chicken
Situation Report for April to June 2023 said that the total chicken inventory reached 200.21 million birds as of June 30, 2023. This was 2.8 percent higher than 194.71 million birds recorded in the same period last year.
It said of the total chicken inventory, native/improved chicken accounted for 43.3 percent, followed by broiler chicken with 34.5-percent share and layer chicken with 22.2-percent share. Broiler chicken refers to chicken bred and raised specifically for meat production.
It said while the country produces chicken for consumption, broiler imports grew over the past years.
According to the Roadmap, from 2014 to 2019, the Philippines imported more chicken meat than Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia.
SMC’s Magnolia is among the country’s top integrators or poultry companies, or production chains, from chicken breeding to feed manufacturing to poultry growing, processing and marketing.