A group of wholesale egg suppliers in Taipei is threatening to halt sales “indefinitely” if the Poultry Association extends a pricing freeze this week amid a domestic egg shortage.
The Poultry Association’s production and marketing supervision committee on Saturday froze the wholesale price of domestically produced eggs, which the group said was unsustainable and would harm egg farmers and suppliers.
The wholesale price of eggs in Taiwan is NT$55 per jin (600g), while the farm gate price is NT$45.5 per jin, the highest in several years, amid an egg shortage caused by avian flu epidemics, increased feed costs and a high number of molting hens, government officials said.
Photo: CNA
One of the Poultry Association committee members said the decision to freeze wholesale prices was partly because Taiwan was importing eggs to alleviate the shortage.
The nation has already taken delivery of part of a shipment of 5 million eggs from Australia and has ordered 2 million from Turkey, which would start arriving next month, Taiwan Egg Marketing Cooperative head Wu Tien-fu (吳天福) said.
When the committee meets this week, it would consider wholesale price adjustments based on whether imported supplies are sufficient to meet market demand, he said.
Lin Tien-lai (林天來), who heads the Taipei commercial egg association, said that he would seek a meeting with officials at the Council of Agriculture (COA), and if wholesale prices remain frozen this week, the egg market might be “closed indefinitely.”
Department of Animal Industry Deputy Director Chiang Wen-chuan (江文全) on Sunday said that the government agency has not been involved in the pricing decisions, or the negotiations between producers and sellers, and was not part of Saturday’s committee meeting.
The COA fully respects the market mechanism, but if the egg price review committee does not set a price, it would be left up to buyers and sellers to negotiate prices, Chiang said.
However, if businesses contravene the market mechanism, government agencies would investigate and address any problems, he added.
Regarding the threat to close the egg market indefinitely, Chiang said there is no unified wholesale market for eggs, so there is no “market closure” mechanism.
Some wholesalers have been offering farmers a price increase of NT$3 per jin in a bid to secure supplies, Wu said, adding that it had been an independent decision by the wholesale buyers and the COA was not involved.
The current daily domestic output of chicken eggs is 22.2 million (111,000 boxes), 200,000 fewer than the 22.4 million over the past few weeks when output was already 500,000 to 800,000 lower than usual, COA data showed.
A Keelung high school on Saturday night apologized for using a picture containing a Chinese flag on the cover of the senior yearbook, adding that it has recalled the books and pledged to provide students new ones before graduation on Thursday. Of 309 Affiliated Keelung Maritime Senior High School of National Taiwan Ocean University graduates, 248 had purchased the yearbook. Some students said that the printer committed an outrageous error in including the picture, while others said that nobody would notice such a small flag on the cover. Other students said that they cared more about the photographs of classmates and what was
GOING INTERNATIONAL: Rakuten Girls squad leader Ula Shen said she was surprised that baseball fans outside of Taiwan not only knew of them, but also knew their names Major League Baseball’s (MLB) Oakland Athletics on Saturday hosted its first Taiwanese Heritage Day event at the Oakland Coliseum with a performance by Taiwanese cheerleading squad the Rakuten Girls and a video message from Vice President William Lai (賴清德). The Rakuten Girls, who are the cheerleaders for the CPBL’s Rakuten Monkeys, performed in front of a crowd of more than 2,000 people, followed by a prerecorded address by Lai about Taiwan’s baseball culture and democratic spirit. Taiwanese pitcher Sha Tzu-chen (沙子宸), who was signed by the Athletics earlier this year, was also present. Mizuki Lin (林襄), considered a “baseball cheerleading goddess” by Taiwanese
WAY OF THE RUKAI: ‘Values deemed worthy often exist amid discomfort, so when people go against the flow, nature becomes entwined with our lives,’ a student said “Run, don’t walk” after your dreams, Nvidia cofounder and chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) told National Taiwan University (NTU) graduates yesterday, as several major universities held in-person graduation ceremonies for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic. “What will you create? Whatever it is, run after it. Run, don’t walk. Remember, either you’re running for food, or you are running from becoming food. Oftentimes, you can’t tell which. Either way, run,” he said. Huang was one of several tech executives addressing graduating students at Taiwanese universities. National Chengchi University held two ceremonies, with alumnus Patrick Pan (潘先國), who is head of Taiwan
A 14-legged giant isopod is the highlight of a new dish at a ramen restaurant in Taipei and it has people lining up — both for pictures and for a bite from this bowl of noodles. Since “The Ramen Boy” launched the limited-edition noodle bowl on Monday last week, declaring in a social media post that it had “finally got this dream ingredient,” more than 100 people have joined a waiting list to dine at the restaurant. “It is so attractive because of its appearance — it looks very cute,” said the 37-year-old owner of the restaurant, who wanted to be