Poultry Slaughter Activity Falls

WASHINGTON - Sep 27/10 - SNS -- NASS is in the process of modifying report layouts in order to improve readability, shows today's USDA update.

This report issue is published using both layouts but all future issues will only be produced with the new layout, which is available on the NASS website: http://www.nass.usda.gov. This is the last issue using this layout.

Ready-to-Cook Weight Up 6% from Last Year

Poultry certified wholesome during August 2010 (ready-to-cook weight) quantityed to 3.73 billion pounds, up 6% from the amount certified in August 2009. The July 2010 revised certified total at 3.58 billion pounds, was down 2% from July 2009. The July revision represented an increase of 32.1 million pounds from a month ago's preliminary pounds certified.

The preliminary total live weight of poultry inspected during August 2010 was 4.96 billion pounds, up 6% from 4.70 billion pounds a year ago. Young chickens inspected totalled 4.27 billion pounds, up 6% from August 2009. Mature chickens, at 75.1 million pounds, were up 6% from the previous year. Turkey inspections totalled 603 million pounds, up 4% from a year ago. Ducks totalled 14.0 million pounds, up 13% from the previous year.