Island chicken farmers quit
By Catherine E. Toth
Advertiser Staff Writer
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser
The state's main processor of locally raised chickens has switched to only imported birds, meaning consumers will no longer have easy access to what some restaurateurs say is fresher, better-tasting Hawai'i-grown meat.
Sam Kakazu, 80, walks through one of nine chicken pens, now empty, on his Nanakuli farm. When Pacific Poultry, the state's main processor of chicken, decided to buy Mainland chicken instead, Kakazu said he had no choice but to shut down.
Pacific Poultry Co. Ltd. in Kalihi stopped processing locally grown chicken last week, prompting the two remaining O'ahu broiler chicken farmers to shut down. Pacific Poultry will now process exclusively fresh-chilled chicken imported from the Mainland, which it says is of good quality and cheaper.
"It's going to be a little different," said Cowan Wong, owner of the On On at McCully Chinese restaurant. "You can't beat the island chicken."
Lisa Ng-Lum, who owns Happy Day Seafood Restaurant on Wai'alae Avenue, also prefers local chicken: "It's better. Better quality and better tasting. ... I don't know what I'm going to do."
Hawai'i's agriculture industry has shrunk significantly in the past two decades as cheaper imported foods have replaced locally grown products.
"The demand (for local broilers chicken) isn't off," said Steve Gunn, state deputy agriculture statistician. "It's just that there's competition from outside the state."
The planned closing of Foremost Dairies-Hawai'i in November is another example. Just five years ago, 80 percent of the milk consumed in Honolulu was from Hawai'i dairy farms. Now, half is imported.
"I think that we've got an agriculture crisis," said Chin N. Lee, professor of animal sciences at the University of Hawai'i College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources. "All our food is going to come from Mainland imports."
The switch to Mainland chickens at Pacific Poultry will not affect Hawai'i's egg industry. But egg production also has been declining: It dropped from 154 million eggs in 1998 to 117 million in 2002.
Pacific Poultry contracted with broiler chicken farms owned by the Kakazu and Shigeta families in Nanakuli. Now that they have quit raising chickens, Medeiros Farms on Kaua'i is the only remaining farm raising and processing chicken, according to Brent Hancock, co-owner of Pacific Poultry.
Pacific Poultry is bringing in fresh-chilled — not frozen — chicken from Washington state. It will continue to cut up, debone and tray-pack chicken at its facility off Nimitz Highway, as well as process stewing chicken from local egg farms. The Mainland chicken will continue to be sold as 'Ewa Brand chicken, Pacific Poultry's trade name.
"It's good-quality chicken," Hancock said of the Mainland-grown birds. "And it's going to be considerably cheaper."
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser
Raising and processing local chicken has grown more expensive, as raw feed and land tenure costs are higher in Hawai'i than in other parts of the country. Chicken feed, for example, makes up 60 percent of the total cost for Pacific Poultry, which was responsible for providing it to its contract growers. Feed costs have risen with charges for ocean freight to transport it from the Mainland — a cost that states such as California and Washington don't bear.
Lisa Ng-Lum, who owns Happy Day Seafood Restaurant in Kaimuki, carries a dish of cold ginger chicken prepared with fresh locally grown chickens, which she prefers to imports.
"It was too costly," Hancock said.
That was true for competitor State Poultry Processors Inc., which stopped processing locally grown chickens in 1994 because
it wasn't "economically feasible anymore," said president Darryl Uezu. The company now uses Mainland chicken exclusively.
He wasn't surprised to hear about Pacific Poultry's decision.
"I've always thought that if they can do what I can't do, more power to them," Uezu said. "Farming in this state flat-out doesn't work. ... Progress is progress. I look at the Wal-Marts and Costcos coming up, and in some ways they provide a lower cost to consumers. But it sure hurts a lot of us small-business guys along the way, too. If cannot compete, gotta get out and do something else."
Dennis Kinoshita Jr., who runs Stanley's Chicken Market at Ward Farmers Market, was selling about 60,000 fresh, island-grown chickens annually, acting as an intermediary for Pacific Poultry and restaurants.
"It was a shock," Kinoshita said of the news that Pacific Poultry was switching to Mainland birds. "Island chickens are in such demand, and (the farms) couldn't supply that demand. ... This is affecting me a lot."
Being able to say his chickens were grown locally was a source of pride for Kinoshita.
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser
"A lot of local restaurants depend on fresh products, and the less fresh products we get, the more we have to import them ... and the less dependable (the shipments might be)," he said. "I'd rather depend on local."
Guo Zhong Wu chops up a chicken at Happy Day Seafood Restaurant. Chicken processor Pacific Poultry will now sell only fresh-chilled chicken from Washington under its 'Ewa Brand name.
Sam Kakazu, who has owned a chicken and pig farm in Nanakuli since 1947, had no intention of shutting down his chicken operations last week. But when Pacific Poultry, who contracts with Kakazu to raise the chickens, decided to discontinue processing locally grown birds, he said he had no choice.
"We farmers got to be a little bit thick-skinned," said the 80-year-old Kakazu. "We went through ups and downs, ups and downs so much. Can't control the weather, can't control the prices. So actually we take the punches and start all over again. You get numb already. I'm trying to be numb."
He worries about the six-figure debt he has accumulated over the years. He worries about his 52-year-old son, who helped run the farm and now has to find another job. He worries he won't find someone to lease the 9.6-acre farm to pay the bills.
"But if (Pacific Poultry) is losing so much money, how can we make money, too? No sense," Kakazu said. "We have enough debts. I don't want to pile up more. ... The handwriting is on the wall already."
Reach Catherine E. Toth at 535-8103 or ctoth@honoluluadvertiser.com.
