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Avian Flu plagued South Korea buys eggs from US

An egg market reporter says South Korea’s need for eggs – because of the avian flu outbreak there – comes at a good time for U.S. egg producers.

Brian Moscogiuri with Urner Barry says the US egg market was projected to continue its downward trend from the December highs.  “So far we haven’t seen a huge market impact in terms of price,” he says.  “If you look at where pricing and trading is today compared to a week ago, the transactions are actually better by about 15 or 20 cents a dozen.”

This is the first time the country has sought to purchase large quantities of shell eggs from the US.

He tells Brownfield South Korea’s egg shortage comes ahead of its Lunar New Year holiday.  “Prices at wholesale and retail are skyrocketing – similar to what we saw here in the US when we had our avian flu outbreak,” he says.  “There are people going without eggs as they approach what is one of their big egg holidays on January 27^th.”

He says South Korea lost 26 million layers and the US is just one of the countries vying for that market share.  “Spain is looking to move product into South Korea, New Zealand, Australia, and the United States,” he says.  “It depends on what portion of that production we get – and it depends on how much of that production they’re actually going to need to bring back in.”

Shipments of shell eggs by air to South Korea began earlier this week and the country has eliminated all tariffs on any egg products – including shell eggs – from the US.

AUDIO: Brian Moscogiuri, Urner Barry