Egg prices up on output shortage, high feed cost

After wheat, pulses and onion egg prices are on the boil. Retail egg prices in the domestic market have touched an all time high of Rs 3 per piece (against Rs 2 last year) owing to shortage in production and rising feed cost.

Due to the rising prices, the wholesale inflation level in egg for the week ended January 27 was 8.83 per cent.

Maize which is the primary feed for the industry is selling at Rs 8-9 per kg compared to Rs 5 last year. Cost of producing an egg has gone up to Rs 1.70 from Rs 1.10 a year ago.

"There is greater demand for eggs from the northern parts owing to unseasonal rains. The farmers had culled large number of birds last year around this time after the cases of bird flu. Cost of maize is high and the government has still not banned exports of maize. Further, the futures trading in the commodity has aggravated price situation", said B R Sainath, Karnataka zonal chairman of National Egg Coordination Committee (NECC).

In 2005-06 calendar year, the country produced about 37,500 million eggs. However, the egg production estimates for 2006-07 are 20 per cent lower at about 30,000 million eggs.

"The country has about 160 million laying hens. Of this, about 115 million hens need to be replaced every year as their laying cycle ends. However, this year, the farmers could only replace 90-95 million hens because of bird flu and therefore the production has declined", said A K Rajput, executive officer of Suguna Poultry.

"The rising egg prices are in tune with higher prices of feed, which has gone up by 30 per cent in the last four months. Last year the consumption was low due to bird flu. Prices will stabilise at the current level and may even go down by April -May", said O P Singh, managing director of the Pune-based Venkateswara Hatcheries.

Egg demand has also increased as people are taking it regularly in their meals because of high green vegetables prices.