Rainbow Chicken, one of South Africa’s oldest and largest poultry producers, has said it expects earnings for its 2026 financial year to increase by more than 100% driven by favourable market conditions.The poultry company, which was unbundled from food producer RCL Foods two years ago, said in a statement on Thursday that HEPS for the year to June 28 is expected to range between 143c and 156.12c, an increase of 118%-138% from a year ago. EPS is expected to rise by as much as 142%, ranging between 141.87c and 154.68c. Rainbow Chicken attributed the surge to an improved demand in poultry products and lower commodity costs buoyed by “robust agricultural and operational performance and cost efficiencies achieved during the reporting period”. This comes as the country had recently experienced periods of stagnation and constrained consumer demand rather than a total structural collapse, with per capita consumption softening under severe economic pressures.The improvement in Rainbow Chicken’s results is a testament to previous estimates by the Poultry and Products Annual Report prepared by FAS Pretoria, which showed that the country’s chicken meat production would grow by 2% to 1.68-million tonnes in 2026, boosted by lower feed costs, sector recovery from avian flu outbreaks, and the R2.1bn invested in production facilities between 2019 and 2023. FAS Pretoria is a regional office of the US department of agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) located at the US embassy. It said in the report that chicken remains the country’s most affordable and popular protein, making up 60% of total meat consumption, with demand forecast to increase slightly to 1.92-million tonnes despite consumers shifting towards cheaper products such as offal and mechanically deboned meat. Poultry imports are expected to decline by 5% to 308,000 tonnes due to tariffs, anti-dumping measures and disease-related restrictions, while exports are projected to rise by 5% to 65,000 tonnes as South African producers expand into export markets, particularly within Southern African Customs Union (Sacu) countries.As conditions in the poultry industry continue to improve, investors have shown growing confidence in producers. Rainbow Chicken has been a major beneficiary, with its share price rising more than 65% since listing on the JSE.In early trade on Thursday, the share was up 8.1% to R6.54. Its market capitalisation now stands at R5.9bn, trailing closely that of its parent cfompany RCL, which is currently valued at just R7.2bn.The company will release its full-year results on August 28. Business Day