Chicken supply 'stable' despite Malaysia's export ban: Minister Desmond Tan

About 34% of Lion City's chicken supply comes from Malaysia.

Singapore's supply of chicken remains "stable" despite temporarily losing one of its major suppliers, Malaysia, Minister of State for Sustainability and the Environment Desmond Tan said.

Malaysia, where 34% of Singapore's chicken supply comes from, announced on May 23 that it will halt its chicken exports to address the local supply shortage and price spikes. The ban took effect on 1 June.

Based on a Bloomberg report, the ban includes "live poultry, whole carcasses, chilled and frozen meat, chicken parts, chicken-based products, chicken nuggets, patties and sausages."

In a Facebook post, Tan said Singapore will source its supply from other countries particularly Australia and Thailand, and more chilled chicken will also come from Brazil and the U.S. in the coming weeks.

The minister said one of the country's food distributors has already secured a deal with importers in Thailand to increase their supply by up to 10 times.

"Rest assured, there is an adequate supply of chicken for everyone if we continue to do our purchases normally," Tan said.

"We will continue to face disruption in our food supply from time to time. We may not fully mitigate these disruptions, but I'm confident that we can get through these occasional disruptions by working together closely," he added.