Find Kosher Chickens Twice As Costly As Non-kosher Ones

The New York City Department of Consumer Affairs, reporting on the findings of the first two “Market Basket” food price surveys since the department agreed to include kosher chicken in the list of items in those surveys, found that kosher chicken prices per pound were more than double those of non-kosher chicken, Councilman Noach Dear, a Brooklyn Democrat, said today.

Dear said the city department had added kosher chicken to its survey list at his request, a request made in support of his contention that “the kosher food price problem is a problem that needs year-around attention, not just publicity around the holidays.”

Dear said the department sends comparison shoppers to 150 retail groceries in all five boroughs, checking prices of 140 items, a procedure that takes two weeks. He said that for the first survey including kosher chickens, May 9 to May 20, 21 of the 150 stores carried kosher chicken. The survey found that kosher chicken sold, on an average of $1.50 per pound, compared with non-kosher chicken average prices of 60 cents, a 90 cent per pound differential.

For the second survey, covering the same 150 stores during the May 23-June 3 period, 24 stores were found to carry kosher chicken and the average price per pound was $1.44, compared to an average for non-kosher chicken of 58 cents, a differential of 86 cents, Dear told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Dear defended a previous report that public pressure had caused a drop of 37 cents per pound in the price of kosher-for-Passover prices before the holiday last March. That report had been questioned by Marvin Schick a long-time Jewish community activist, who said, in a letter to the JTA that while it was true that the consumer affairs department “did indicate that the cost of matzah and other Passover products had gone down, “the period was from April 11 to April 15,” after the holiday.

Schick wrote that “this was after the Passover holiday and therefore it is not surprising that products which had been prepared primarily for Passover use were now being sold at a reduced price. There was no decrease in price before Passover and there was, at best, a small decline during the holiday.”