Indonesia boycotts American chicken

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Neil Carey knew it wouldn't be easy selling chicken to a Muslim country like Indonesia. He had to fly in two imams to his Missouri slaughterhouse to certify that the chickens were halal, or permissible to eat under Islamic law.

He never expected his efforts to land his company in the middle of a trade fight between the United States and Indonesia -- a battle sparked by Indonesia's decision to ban American poultry two years ago.

Since then, Carey has seen his Indonesian importer tossed in jail and tons of his company's chicken impounded.

"It's frustrating," said Carey, director of international sales for Simmons Foods Inc. of Siloam Springs, Ark. "You never like to lose a market."

Publicly, the Indonesian government won't speak about the ban, although it has said it would prevent non-halal chickens from getting into the country.

"We are in the process of settling this," agriculture minister Bungaran Saragih said recently. "It is no good to discuss this in the public. It will only make it more difficult to come to a win-win solution."

The price of success

Indonesia is not alone in its rejection of American poultry. Since 1990, American chicken exports have tripled and with that has come squawks of protest from countries around the world.

South Africa banned American chicken imports, accusing Americans of undercutting local producers. Russia slapped a temporary ban on American chicken this year amid allegations that U.S. chicken plants were unsanitary. And a federation of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations poultry producers met recently to discuss ways to protect their local markets from imports.

"Unfortunately, it's the price of success," said Toby Moore, spokesman for the USA Poultry and Egg Export Council in Atlanta.

"A lot of countries view imports of American poultry as an easy target to make their own political statements," he said.

Going through the hoops

Carey --whose company exports chicken to about 10 Muslim countries -- thought he was doing everything right when he began sending chicken parts to Indonesia in 1999. Two imams spent a week at his company's plant in Southwest City, Mo., as the Indonesia-bound birds were slaughtered.

"I was going through hoops to get it done," Carey said. "That is what my company does. Our customer expected us to do it and we do it."

Within months, Simmons was shipping up to 300 tons of chicken parts a month to Indonesia. But by the summer 2000, Indonesia banned all American chicken imports.

Moore says the ban has more to do with political pressure from local poultry cartels than religion.