OAK BLUFF, Man. – A group of Canadian egg producers has reached a significant consensus in opinion about how to meet future demand in the processing market.
As demand grows for industrial eggs, farmers will receive the going world price for eggs sold to processors.
“I think everybody is satisfied, more or less, that this is the way to go,” said Frank Friesen, a member of the national committee that has been studying the issue since summer.
It’s a big shift from the way Canadian eggs have been priced in the past.
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Processors buy eggs from the Canadian Egg Marketing Agency at the going world price, which is often as little as one-third of the domestic price.
Farmers pay levies to make up for the difference between their costs of production and the often-lower industrial price. In Manitoba, total levies now add up to 25 cents per dozen eggs, Friesen said.
Producers pass on the levies to consumers, who pay a price for table eggs that come in cartons based on cost of production.
Demand from processors has grown rapidly over the past 15 years, and is projected to continue.
Friesen told a meeting of Manitoba egg farmers that it doesn’t make sense for them to raise the price of table eggs to subsidize a competing product like industrial eggs.
Future growth in the industrial market will be met through provincially administered Grow For Processing programs, similar to the export program Manitoba has run for the past two years.
Friesen said CEMA will continue to sell its current allotment of industrial eggs to processors.
New demand will be filled through contracts between provincial boards and processors, at prices not lower than the CEMA industrial egg price, he said.
Friesen said the committee still has another thorny issue to settle – how to allocate future table egg quota.
Some provinces have a smaller share of quota than their share of Canada’s population, and would like to produce more eggs.
