US meat giant Sanderson Farms said it expects poultry production levels to be limited for the remainder of the year.

Speaking on the firm’s earnings conference call, chairman and Joe Sanderson told analysts that the industry will not see a “huge increase” in poultry production due to banking constraints.

“I’m of the impression that you’re not going to see an increase because of banking constraints on a good deal of the industry and because of the experience of 2008 scared a lot of people to death along with a lot of the bankers,” Sanderson said.

“I think there are a lot of people out there that don’t want a lot of chickens. I think a lot of those things are going to influence people not to put out a lot more chickens.”

The firm this morning said that demand for chicken had boosted profits in the first-half of its fiscal year.

For the six months ended 30 April, the firm earned US$50.9m compared to a profit of $19.5m in the prior year. Net sales climbed 11.2% to $907.2m.

The firm said it remains focused on its incremental markets, including Mexico and some of the former USSR but said Russia was still a country that remained “closed”.

“Export volumes to Mexico are up and also to some of the former Soviet Union countries and there is more dark meat being sold in US,” Sanderson told analysts.

“We’re shipping to the same countries we’ve always been shipping to except we’re not shipping anything to Russia and we’re not shipping anything directly to China.”