"If we have chickens, we’ll sell them, if we don't have chickens, we’ll rest instead. It all depends on the situation now," says market vendors.

There is a shortage of broiler chickens in the market, and after the government listed clean chickens as a standard product, it is difficult to find clean chickens sold below the ceiling price in the market. Hence, vendors resort to selling only when stock is available.

Every year during festive seasons such as Lunar New Year or Hari Raya, the government will list some products as controlled products, including clean chicken. The current wholesale price of clean chicken is RM8 and the retail price is RM8.90 sen. However, the market price has far exceeded the listed price.

In order to solve the chicken shortage problem, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri announced yesterday that the cabinet has decided that starting from June 1, Malaysia will stop exporting 3.6 million chickens every month until chicken prices and production stabilize.

However, most of the hawkers in the market aren’t convinced.

When a reporter from the "Metropolis 大都会" community newspaper visited Klang Middle Road this morning, all the interviewed chicken traders said in unison that the recent supply of broiler chickens scarce indeed, and the traders can only act accordingly to the daily supply.

They said it’s extremely hard to sell clean chicken at RM8 per kg. Some hawkers are forced to buy more expensive chicken to sell, cutting up whole chickens and selling them in parts.

They said that according to the situation in previous years, the government will include chicken as a standard product two weeks before and after the festive season.

"We also understand the plight of the farmers. They also face problems such as feed price hikes, lack of government subsidies, environmental factors, etc. We hope the government will try to solve them as soon as possible, otherwise everyone will suffer."

Reference Links - 
[1] Sin Chew Daily