Eggs now cheaper by the dozen

There is good news coming from the Belize Poultry Association tonight and it is just in time for Easter. In a meeting of egg producers last Friday, it was decided that since production has improved, the price of eggs is going down with immediate effect. If you purchase eggs individually you may not see the decrease, but if you purchase by the dozen you will see a drop in the range of twenty cents since the cost of each case of three hundred and sixty eggs is going down by ten dollars. Manager of the Belize Poultry Association, Orlando Habet, told News Five in a phone interview today that although the prices are going down, it varies from district to district because of delivery costs and the grade of the eggs.

Orlando Habet, Manager, Belize Poultry Association
“They agreed that they would have a reduction in the price of table eggs from the price that we had previously of eighty-nine to ninety dollars per case of three hundred and sixty eggs down to seventy-nine to eighty dollars per case. However, it is understood that because there are different producers and different people who have varying additional costs. So delivery by truck to Belize City from Spanish Lookout, to Corozal and Toledo will make the price increase for delivery, so somewhere around four to five dollars for maybe Toledo and Belize City.”

“The reason for the reduction is that they have been looking at the prices of the inputs and truly the only input price that really has gone down in the last two or three months was the concentrate; the protein concentrate but it didn’t go down significantly. However, production of table eggs for the Christmas season wasn’t sufficient but because we had to do some importation. However, the increased amount of birds that had to be put in to get that production are now in peak production and so we have an increase in productivity. Therefore, this was an appropriate time to put the reduction.”

Delahnie Bain
“Okay and do you think these prices are going to stay down for long?”

Orlando Habet
“It will depend on the prices of the inputs as they come in.”

Habet says there are no further reductions in sight at this time because the prices of the major inputs have not gone down.