After Malaysia had announced that it will halt chicken exports from 1 June due to a shortage in the country, both consumers and F&B business owners in Singapore have braced themselves for its impact – be it finding alternative meat sources or preparing to fork out a little more for a taste of poultry.
However, the price tag on a particular chicken sold by NTUC FairPrice surpassed everyone’s eggs-pectations.
Just a day before 1 June, this image went viral on social media for all the wrong reasons:
As seen, the image depicts what appears to be the price tag for a product named “SB Whole Chicken” at NTUC FairPrice. Details on the product include the packed date (31 May 2022), the price/kg ($22.50) and the country of origin of the chicken (Malaysia).
While the shortage in supply reasonably leads to a potential increase in price of the meat, the average price for a whole chilled chicken was only $7.21 per kg in April this year (up from $6.60 per kg in March) according to data from the Singapore Department of Statistics.
Therefore, is there some ‘fowl’ play involved in this incident?
NTUC FairPrice clarifies the matter
On 2 June, NTUC FairPrice attempted to smooth the ruffled feathers of the public with a clarification post on Facebook.
In the post, NTUC FairPrice clarified that the product label is of organic kampung chicken sold at one of their concessionaire counters operated by Swiss Butchery. They added that the product label showed the product weight of over 3kg as “2 whole birds were packed together, weighed and priced under the same label”.
For reference, when we did a check on NTUC FairPrice’s website, we saw whole chickens from different brands being sold for lower prices:
Therefore, while the label is indeed legitimate and it is true that a consumer would need to fork out over $70 for that particular product, it is important to note that it indicates the price of two (rather premium) birds.