Economic analysis of chicken meat production in Behbahan Township

Chicken meat has special importance in human nutrition. Behbahan Township occupied 5th rank in chicken meat production between all townships of Khuzestan province. The present study investigated economic aspects of broiler production in this township. For this purpose, Cobb-Douglas production function was estimated and total factor productivityand profitability of the activity was determined. The necessary data was collected by survey and completion of questionnaire from all 44 active broiler farms in this township in 2012. The results showed that the average age and job experience of studied broiler farmers was 43 and 14.5 years, respectively. Meanwhile, 88.5 percent of broiler farms were without technical manager. From producer's viewpoint, price fluctuation, existence of middlemen and change in government policies were three basic problems of broiler industry, respectively. The estimation of production elasticity of inputs showed that one percent increase in labor and feed inputs would increase chicken production by 0.78 and 0.73 percent, respectively. The total factor productivity was 2.23 for all broiler farms, which shows that on an average, the producer earns 2.23 Rials in return for 1 Rial cost of production. By the way, the average cost of production and profit from production of one kilogram of live chicken was determined 1178 Rials, respectively.