DA eyes egg processing facility

The Department of Agriculture (DA) has rejected the proposal of the newly-created Philippine Egg Board (PEB) to put up a P116-million liquid egg processing plant.

Instead, the PEB was advised to set up a dried egg processing facility to boost the egg industry’s competitiveness and raise its chances of getting into the export trade.

"To boost their competitiveness, I’ve asked the board to go for both liquid and powdered egg plants and we in the government will do our share in helping them turn their vision into a reality," said Agriculture Secretary Luis Lorenzo.

A feasibility study for a liquid egg processing plant was drafted by the PEB led by Rizal Poultry farm owner Gregorio San Diego Jr. along with the Livestock Development Council and private consultancy firm Datacon.

In recent years, traditional bulk buyers of fresh eggs, particularly mayonnaise and salad dressing makers and fastfood chains, shifted to buying cheap imported eggs. As a result, the local egg industry suffered steep price drops due to increasing production but weakening demand.

Government figures show imports of processed egg like egg powder, dried and liquid yolk and dried and liquid albumin went up 163.3 percent from 592.6 metric tons in 1998 to 1,560.5 mt in 2002. On the other hand, local egg production increased by 14.8 percent to 4.74 billion eggs in the last five years.

San Diego said the proposed processing plant would command a uniform selling price of P90.40 per kilogram for liquid egg yolk, liquid egg white and liquid whole egg to compete head on with the P107.18/kg of imported liquid egg yolk and P214.26/kg imported egg white.

"With the processing plant, industrial users will source their requirements locally due to our competitive price, therefore stimulating demand for local egg. This will also help stabilize farm gate egg prices which went down to P2.40 per piece from P2.70 two weeks ago," said San Diego.