Traders decry poor business

Pugu Animal market

Goats and sheep traders at Pugu market have decried declining auctioning of animals at the market, blaming market glutting and low purchasing power of potential buyers.

They said the market received surplus supply of goats and sheep from upcountry, with traders anticipating to capitalise on the Eid-el-Fitr celebrations that marked the end of fasting month of Ramadan for Muslims.

Pugu’s goat trader William Mwalyema told the ‘Daily News’ that upcountry’s dealers brought more animals expecting high demand but ended up being frustrated with the market. “The market was not good this year compared to last year,” Mr Mwalyema said.

He said most of the purchased goats were of low grades at prices of between 50,000/- and 70,000/- while high quality animals received low attention from buyers, signifying customers’ low purchasing power.

“In general, grade one goats were sold slowly compared to the lower grades,” he said. Due to the poor market condition, prices of yesterday, the second Eid day slumped by about 20 per cent with few buyers seen at the market.

According to the weekly market information summary, average daily price for male goat Grade 2(G2) shot up by over 25 per cent to 113,500/- from 90,500/- per animal for the week ending last Friday.

The summary issued by Ministry of Industry and Trade shows that male G3 prices also increased by almost 17 per cent to 63,000/- from 52,500/- per head or female goats prices also climbed up by 6.1 per cent and 4.3 per cent to 87,500/- and 49,000/- respectively.

On cattle market, however, the trend was opposite as average sales per day increased by almost 12 per cent to 747 animals from 669 heads of last week.

The sales pushed down prices for mature female grade 2 (G2) by 1.3 per cent to 533,000/- from 540,000/-per animal while female G2 sunk 1.8 per cent to 479,000/- from 488,000/- per cattle.

A meat wholesaler at Vingunguti’s slaughter house, Mr Noel Makula, said yesterday that due to limited supply prices during the first day of Eid shot up to 5,000/- per kilogramme of meat compared to 4,000/- a day before the celebrations. 

“Prices were expected to descend to below 4,000/- per kilo (yesterday) after the hectic day of Eid,” Mr Makula said.

Source: The Daily News,dailynews.co.tz, reported by Abduel Elinaza

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