Chicken Prices At Ciracas Market Rise, Traders Have Difficulty Paying Rentals For Lapak

Chicken meat Traders At Ciracas Market, East Jakarta/ Photo: IST

JAKARTA - Since the last two months, the price of chicken meat at Ciracas Market, East Jakarta has increased significantly. Of course, this makes traders complain that it is difficult to pay stall rentals.

"The price, which was originally around Rp. 50,000 per kilogram, has now reached Rp. 60 thousand. As a result, buyers are starting to be reluctant to buy, even some traders choose to close their stalls because there is no transaction," said one of the chicken meat traders at Ciracas Market named Meli (36), ANTARA, Tuesday, October 28.

Meli, who has been selling at Ciracas Market for years, admitted that she had to rack her brain so that her efforts remained in the midst of lower people's purchasing power.

One way he does it is by reducing the number of daily expenditures so that there are not many stocks left.

"The spending doesn't have to be too much. Usually, how much is the spending, now it's reduced, so let's minimize the remaining goods," said Meli.

Another chicken meat trader, Sari (38), who seems busy arranging chicken meat at his selling table, admitted that before the price of chicken meat rose, he was able to sell 50 to 60 kilograms of chicken meat per day.

Currently, he said, the figure has dropped to only 30 to 40 kilograms. Even so, Sari is still grateful to have permanent customers, one of which is a restaurant around the market that helps turn its merchandise around.

"Fortunately we still have subscriptions, like a restaurant, so we can still play around. If the rest, yes, I'll put it again, tomorrow it will be sold again," said Sari.

On the other hand, he mentioned that the price increase in chicken meat was unstable. Prices had fallen by around Rp. 2,000 to Rp. 3,000 per kilogram, but the decline only lasted a while.

Shortly thereafter, prices jumped again by more than Rp. 5,000, making buyers rethink before buying chicken meat.

"I had dropped slightly, but not long ago. Suddenly it went up again, even higher. Yes, it was confused too," said Sari.

This condition made many small traders at Ciracas Market give up. Some of them even choose to stop selling or move to other locations that are considered more crowded.

There are also those who change to sell other goods because the profits from chicken meat are no longer comparable to operational costs and rent stalls in the market.

"Now there are also many chicken traders. Outside the market there are also stalls that sell, so the competition is getting tougher," said Sari.

In addition to having an impact on chicken meat traders, price increases have also hit culinary business players who use chicken as the main ingredient.

According to Sari, some restaurant customers even reduced orders, while others chose to temporarily close until prices returned to normal.

He also hopes that the government can immediately take concrete steps to stabilize prices. Traders also ask for supervision of the distribution and supply of chickens so that price games do not occur at the level of collectors.

"If possible, yes, prices are stable. It's a pity for small traders, if the price continues to rise, buyers also run away. We want to sell cheaply, we can't, we want to go up afraid of not selling well," added Sari.