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SANDAKAN – Hari Raya Haji or not, a small livestock farmer who sells cattle and goats here said that the pandemic has affected his business to a point that he is selling at a loss.
Faizal Musta, 35, who has been in the business for 18 years said that he had never experienced such difficulty until the pandemic came.
As a small-scale farmer, he said that even though there is still demand for his cattle and goats in the district, people have started to bargain for much lower prices than before.
“The biggest challenge for our business right now is the sharp increase in animal feed for the past two years. That had greatly increased our cost.
“Another challenge is that people started asking for much cheaper prices for our livestock. If we don’t sell, we don’t earn anything. At times, we were forced to sell at a loss because we have no other sources of income,” he told The Vibes in an interview.
Faizal said the price of a goat is between RM700 and RM2,000, while a cow or bull from RM3,800 to RM8,000, according to its size.
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He explained that raising a goat requires seven to eight months, while raising a cow or bull would take about two and a half years before they are the right size for sale.
“Imagine, while raising these animals we have to bear the cost for risk, food and their shelter. When people demand way lower prices than we have spent raising them, it can force us to go out of business, especially for small farmers like myself,” the father of four said.
In previous years before the pandemic, Faizal said that it is common for him to receive higher demand before Hari Raya Haji.
“But for last year and this year, the sales did not increase at all. Our demands remain at the same rate, but people are forcing unreasonably low prices now.
“Seeing that the Covid-19 new cases remained high for the past few weeks, we did not expect higher sales for AidilAdha this year. We just hope that people would just purchase from us our normal price,” he said. – The Vibes, July 18, 2021
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