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Thailand: Government poised to ramp up egg shipments
The government looks set to accelerate the export of eggs in a move to tackle a domestic oversupply.
According to Wattanasak Sur-iam, director-general of the Internal Trade Department, with a drastic fall in foreign tourist arrivals and more students learning online as part of pandemic protocols, domestic egg consumption has sharply dropped to about 38 million eggs a day.
Domestic egg production stands at 42 million eggs a day.
Ex-farm prices of eggs in mixed sizes are now quoted at an average of 2.50 baht each, down from 2.80 baht prior to the outbreak of the pandemic.
The current retail prices are lower than farmers’ production cost, which averages 2.70 baht per egg.
There are 130,000 households of chicken egg farmers, with Thailand’s egg market worth 40 billion baht last year, down by 43% from 2019.
According to Mr Wattanasak, to help tackle the domestic oversupply, the Egg Board late last month agreed to provide 51 million baht allocated from the farmers’ assistance fund to support farmers, traders and exporters with management costs such as packing, transport and egg grading, at a rate of 50 satang per egg.
The farmers’ assistance fund committee met on March 3 and endorsed the aid programme.
The programme is slated to run from March 3 until August.
He said as part of the Commerce Ministry’s responsibility, it pledged to speed up the export of around 200 million eggs by the end of August.
According to the Livestock Development Department, Thailand exported 221 million eggs in 2020, down 18.4% from the previous year.
Hong Kong and Singapore are the key export markets for Thai eggs.
In January, the country shipped 23.9 million eggs, a surge of 155% over the same month last year, with 62% bound for Hong Kong, 34% for Singapore and 4% to other markets.
Mr Wattanasak said the Agriculture and Cooperatives Ministry and Livestock Development Department are scheduled to discuss whether to control egg production with all relevant stakeholders.
According to the Livestock Development Department, as of Feb 25 there are 50.5 million laying hens in the country, with egg production estimated at 42.0 million per day this year.
Source: https://www.bangkokpost.com/business/2079871/government-poised-to-ramp-up-egg-shipments