Organic egg producers who are hoping for an end to falling demand will find no comfort in the views of Sainsbury’s poultry buyer David Whiffen.
David was one of the speakers taking part in a talk entitled ’Challenges and opportunities for the poultry industry’ at the Pig and Poultry Fair. He was asked by one member of the audience for his thoughts on the future prospects for organic egg sales. His response was not an optimistic one.
"I am not an expert on egg, I know about chicken, but what I can tell you is that I haven’t seen the bottom of the market yet. It is still declining year on year, week on week. I would like to see where the bottom is but at the moment I don’t see it," said David. "We will always be selling organic chicken and organic eggs in Sainsbury’s. The reason for that is our most loyal customers want it. It is key at Sainsbury’s, but I cannot tell you when or where we will reach the bottom of the market."
His comments came after the release of the latest UK egg statistics, which showed that packing station throughput of organic eggs was down again in the first quarter of this year. The figure for the first three months of this year was 249,000 cases. That compares with 259,000 cases in the first quarter of last year and 366,000 cases in the first quarter of 2008. Organic eggs accounted for less than four per cent of eggs going through UK packing stations in the first quarter of this year.
In comparison, free range eggs accounted for 39 per cent of the total and cage eggs made up 52 per cent of all eggs passing through packing stations. The free range total for the first three months of this year was 2,555,000 compared with 2,121,000 in the same period last year and 1,920,000 in the first quarter of 2008.
Total throughput of all eggs in the first quarter of this year was 6,498,000 compared with 6,119,000 last year and 6,079,000 in 2008. In England and Wales this year’s first quarter figures were up to 4,865,000 from 4,708,000 last year. In Scotland throughput rose from 906,000 to 999,000. In Northern Ireland throughput increased from 505,000 to 633,000.
The statistics also show percentage of throughput by size. Six per cent of throughput was very large eggs, 45 per cent was large eggs and 40 per cent was medium eggs. Small eggs accounted for 3.3 per cent. Graded seconds accounted for 6.1 per cent of the total.
The weighted average packer to producer price of all eggs during the first quarter of 2010 was 74.8 pence per dozen. This was an increase of 5.1 per cent on the same period of 2009. The price listed for free range was 91.3 pence per dozen compared with a figure of 88.9 pence in the same period last year and 89.7 pence in 2008.
UK processors took 1.185 million cases of eggs during the first three months of this year. This was a decrease of 8.2 per cent on the same period last year. The processors produced 22,399 tonnes of egg products during this period. This was a fall of 6.9 per cent on production during the same period the previous year. Liquid and frozen egg accounted for 14,962 tonnes.
