Will we see $15 per dozen eggs as drumming all over the news headlines, as a result of phasing out caged eggs ?
Some reporting New Zealand already been paying $12 for their eggs. Is that true ?
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Edit: Some Ozb confirmed paying $1 per egg / average $9 per dozen in NZ
https://www.ozbargain.com.au/comment/14033377/redir
https://www.ozbargain.com.au/comment/14018279/redir
https://www.ozbargain.com.au/comment/14020719/redir
https://www.countdown.co.nz/shop/browse/pantry/eggs
cue the sensationalist headlines about house prices rising and dropping in a week
more example of lazy journalism
First we have shortages of toilet paper, now eggs!
What ever will the poor teenagers throw at people's houses now!?
Won't somebody please think of the children?
I guess they're only reporting what the farmers are saying, but I think we should be very sceptical of what farmers have to say on this issue.
My guess is farmers make a mint on caged eggs and want to scare the government into backtracking.
exactly. Why would the government ban cage egg, when they can put a levy on them?
If we cant trust the news what can we trust?
I hate eggsageration
On a site where 10% off something 999 people don't need generates 1,000 clicks in half an hour, I imagine posts like this have a self-fulfilling prophecy of people panic buying eggs today and tomorrow after reading this, "just in case"…
Screw that. Its a pandemic so I'm buying chickens to solve this crisis.
They can lay those damn eggs on a soft bed of pillows I make from the 165 rolls of toilet paper I have….
I get it though, eggs are hard to come by and in my experience it has always been expensive to get laid..
Sadly I actually do have 165 rolls of toilet paper but thats a story for another day.
buy chooks >feed them old newspaper> then turn chook shit into pseudo dunny rolls so you can deprive pensioners of bum wiping in multiple ways?
Humans. ?
Only want stuff when they hear there's a possible shortage ahead. Eggs will sit idle in suburbia and rot , but hey. I beat some other fkr to them in Woolies.
End result ?>the egg hoarders will go off eggs and then the market will head south forcing prices to go through the roof forever
Greed will always trump need.
Temper your expectations.
Chickens can go from 2 weeks to 2 months at a time not laying eggs, if one or more in the flock decides to go broody. They each go broody countless times a year. Generally speaking if one decides to go broody, the rest of the flock will stop laying eggs too. It's very common for the flock to go broody one after the other, so sometimes you can go for many months at a time with no eggs.
Then, just like renewable power, they produce substantially less in general with poor weather conditions or in the cold. Their maintenance costs will also often exceed their value combined with what they produce.
I was considering getting some chickens since I have space in the backyard for them, can feed them food scraps. I do need to look into it though.. Might not end up doing it based on what you're suggesting however.
@Matt86: Nah chickens are awesome and they definitely grow on you.
Nothing like fresh eggs in the morning.
Mine babysit my 2yo so they could never lay and I'm still in the black.
Re broodiness, it really depends on the breed, we've got Isa Browns and an Australorp and in the 16 months we've had the Isa's only one of them has ever purposely sat on the eggs and tried to attack when collecting them in the morning and she only did it one time, after that it was back to normal.
The Australorp however has gone broody twice in less time (we got her Nov-22) and other than being super stubborn and growling at literally anything, there's been no impact to supply.. in fact it's made for some hilarious encounters as the Isa's get creative in where they lay their eggs - you'd think the empty second nesting box would do but nope, they'll literally stand over the Australorp and drop the egg next to her where she'll then quickly scoop it under herself.
Regarding seasonal changes, even though ours are molting right now we're still getting enough to meet our somewhat low demand so are selling the excess dozen or so weekly.. we get 3-4 eggs across the 7 chickens per day. The Australorp however hasn't layed an egg that I'm aware of in some time, maybe molting or may be age related as the previous owner knew / shared very little.
As a general comment, chickens make fantastic pets as they eat food scraps which cuts down on waste, are quite low maintenance, are often very entertaining and provide you with fresh food for the care you provide to them, and if you add to that there's less birds in cages then it's a real win/win. The only negatives we've noticed is the ground can get sloppy in winter when it rains and you have to turn the dirt every few weeks to help with drainage.. the resulting smell isn't the best either. We've also seen a few dead mice and 1 dead rat in the yard which the chickens quickly ate 🤢 their presence will undoubtedly attract pests like this.
Of course check with your local council on what you can and can't do in this space and only consider it if you're prepared to care for them when they lay and when they inevitably stop at they age. So many chickens just get dumped when they stop :( also it's worth noting that you should always have at least 2 birds as they're social creatures who need at least 1 companion.
amazon prime toilet paper deals?
That makes no sense, you cant buy a 1000 eggs and hoard them for the next 5 years.
Why would that happen when cage free eggs are already just a few cents more per dozen than caged eggs.
Thinking about this some more, if cage eggs were suddenly banned then I guess it could create an egg shortage which would take a few chicken generations to correct. Though then again, you wouldn't just kill all the caged chickens, you'd just release them from their cages and buy some more land. I really don't think a massive egg shortage is likely when Australia is chock full of land.
I guess buying more land costs money and they mentioned 3x labour work between caged and cage-free, whilst also implication on finance / loans of existing land/barn/caged-infrastructure with additional funds required for transitioning to cage free.
New Zealand already paying $12 now (if confirmed true) , and they have been planning it ever since 2012 , not immediate ban 2023.
But if you look at eggs at supermarket the non caged eggs are like 40 cents more. To be honest I actually buy the cheapest ones, unless the non caged ones have a used by date significantly later. But it seems like 3x labour work and the finance / loans and all the rest only adds like 4 cents per egg.
To be honest I actually buy the cheapest ones,
You should buy cage free eggs.
@AustriaBargain: If more people buy non-cage, then less chickens will have to live in a cage. The price is barely different.
@AustriaBargain: https://www.ozbargain.com.au/comment/14016083/redir
And yet your other examples of "virtue signaling" are legendary.
@Speckled Jim: Just like Austria Bargain's reply, I am not sure what you mean SJ.
I am not part of the select club that speaks in unintelligent code.
I speak plain English, and I suggest others do the same.
@Smol Cat: Well we do eat these animals, just how much do you care about them? I think chickens should be free range, but I also think the government should enforce it. Whether or not an animal lives in a cage shouldn’t be left to the whims of people in the supermarket aisle.
@AustriaBargain: I think any animal that has been given decent living conditions throughout its life and fed well and treated well is fair to be given a quick death without excessive cruelty to be turned into food. There is no need to inflict suffering on an animal throughout its life just to squeeze out another few cents of profit for the shareholders. Society as a whole should be moving away from that 'profit above all else' mindset. There is a cost to everything and it isn't always about how many $ you save.
Yes I agree this is a problem for the government to enforce, but the people form the government and it's up to the population to also have that mindset to change.
@Smol Cat: So should human families go without a cheap protein just because the government rushes through a ban on caged eggs without creating a transition plan to cage free eggs? Some families who buy eggs can't afford to regularly buy meat and rely on the protein to sustain their children's brain development.
@AustriaBargain: Mate what are you on about? It doesn't have to be mutually exclusive mate. Let the big brain government figure it out, I don't care how they do it. The difference between caged and cage free at the moment is like a few cents. IDGAF how they do it or when they do it, I'm just saying it is obviously not some gargantuan impossible task that'll crash the entire egg economy that some people on here like yourself are going on about. It's some chickens and eggs mate, not rocket science.
Also you know what else is even cheaper protein - beans. Are you saying the bean market will implode now due to some perceived egg shortage?
@Smol Cat: But if the big brain government doesn't figure it out, like the big brain Kiwi government didn't figure it out, do you really think it's fair for millions of low income families to go without eggs because they are now $3 each?
There's plenty of things we will never let the government do because they aren't big brained enough to solve the problems around it first.
@AustriaBargain: Oh no, it is now $3 PER EGG in this hypothetical dystopian fever dream world concocted by AustriaBargain. How will my life ever go on without my precious daily egg! My sustenance!
Why "to be honest"?
Austria: But it seems like 3x labour work and the finance / loans and all the rest only adds like 4 cents per egg.
cow: You dont understand business. Most of what you pay doesnt goto the farmer, there are a lot of parasites along the way. Buy a tv for example only half of that actually goes to Sony.
@CowFrogHorse: Well it seems the real issue is that businesses seem to use a lot of cage eggs. Right now there are enough free range eggs to cover everyone at Woolies so the price difference is minimal. But if the thousands of bakeries in Australia were suddenly cut off from their caged supply they would have to buy those same free range eggs, causing a massive egg shortage until the industry stabilises by building more chicken farms on cheap land. Though the changes won't come in until 10 years from now you can bet that predictions of egg prices tripling is not much of an incentive for egg producers to form a peak body and make sure there are enough eggs to keep prices low 10 years from now. Why spend money increasing capacity when your eggs are going to be worth a fortune? Having one farm produce 10,000 eggs at 90 cents each is more profitable than paying for three farms to produce 30,000 eggs at 30 cents each. Sure eventually more farms will be built when everyone realises eggs are worth so much, but people tend to react after a crisis happens, not before.
@AustriaBargain: Your entire reply is broken, the easiest way to counter this is to highlight your claims comments about farmers getting 90c and 30c an egg. They simply do not get anywhere near that amount.
https://eggfarmersaustralia.org/
Egg farmers produce 17 million eggs every single day of the year to feed Australian families. We represent eighty five percent of all Australian egg farming and
Thats billions of eggs a year, its obvious the egg farmers are not making 8M a day if we pretend they make 50c an egg. They probably make something closer to 5 - 10c an egg. If the price goes up $1 for a dozen that barely gives the actual farmer who actually has the chickens probably 5c.
LIke it or not, Woolies and the distributors along the way get the lions share or 90%+ of the price you and me pay.
Yes, and some farmers have waited to the last minute resulting in temporary lack of supply.
The reason is most commercial use eggs are cage eggs and free range is three times more labour intensive than cage.
Sez the cage egg industry. I think it is purest crap, as evidenced by the small difference in current price of cage and barn eggs. If it cost three times as much labour that would simply not be so.
Every time an industry has some new regulation proposed for it they come up with this sort of bunkum (remember how only a few weeks ago allowing prescriptions to cover 60 instead of 30 days was going to mean pensioners could not get their scripts filled according to the Pharmacy Guild? Or remember how supermarket milk was going to send every dairy in the country broke so milk was going to cost $5 a litre?).
If it cost three times as much labour that would simply not be so.
unless labour is not a significant part of the cost basis.
transport, feed, land overheads are all probably way larger impact on price.
@Antikythera: So really the cost increase is very slight to the factory farms and it's really pure greed driving this as per usual. Profit above all else.
Same reason its cheaper to give money to private schools vs build more public schools.
If all the demand suddenly lands on cage free eggs, I imagine that their prices will go up.
It is stupid news headlines like this that will cause people to panic buy eggs and cause the price to go up.
Seeing as free range eggs have been available for like a decade for around $4-6 a dozen, i can't fathom why a decrease in caged eggs would do anything but increase production of free range eggs and maintain or even lower the current price.
40% of eggs sold are caged.
You need to increase production of free range eggs before removing caged-eggs.
https://youtu.be/s_eZ00M11cQ?t=247
Not sure what happened to New Zealand eggs prices though. They have been planning since 2012 but still having free-range eggs shortage.
A hen makes an egg every 24-32 hours depending on the breed, regardless of whether they're caged or free.
Where exactly do you think the currently laying hens are going to go?
The same number of eggs will be laid, the only variables here are land and labor, which only adds ~4 cents per free-range egg
It's every 24 hours for egg-laying chooks like clockwork.
If not the chook would get the chop.
The chooks will be killed in the cages. Even free-range chooks take a break in laying after about 12 months, instead of waiting for them to start laying again they kill them all. They kill them on a clock even if they are still laying, it's just cheaper to bring new chooks in.
Go to a cage farm they cannot simply become free-range.
@811b11e8: Yes, their reproductive systems are exhausted after 2 years and their health deteriorates after that.
Many pure bread chickens may live around 8 years, but lay at about 2/3 the rate, say 220 eggs per year vs 330 depending on the bread.
some kind of dirty business trick.Don't get trap.No One buy it will drop to $2….believe me.
Caged eggs are cruel, if you want eggs pay for ones where the chickens are raised properly.
No they won't be $12, free range eggs have been like $5 for ages.
This report as of May, New Zealand is paying $8.58 per dozen.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/492153/here-s-why-egg-pr…
And news today reports, New Zealand is paying over $12 per dozen
Looking at Countdown seems that the cheapest dozen eggs is $8.30NZD, so you're right
https://www.countdown.co.nz/shop/productdetails?stockcode=23…
Right, so AU$8.20, not $12.
That's pretty much in line with the current grocery price hikes anyway.
Caged eggs are cruel, if you want eggs pay for ones where the chickens are raised properly.
Both caged and cage-free chickens are killed at around 18 months of age, less than half their full laying age and only a part of their possible life span.
If you were overly precious about that in reality, you wouldn't be eating eggs or chicken at all.
Wanting an animal to be well looked after in life is not the same as not wanting to eat it. I'm thankful to the animal, least I can do is spend in a way that encourages farmers to look after them well in life.
People should want farm animals to have healthy & stress free lives because in the end they are going to eat it.
Most people don't care, nor do they need too.
I was talking to a colleague who's father owned an egg business in Canada. She had turned vegan as a result of seeing big piles of dead male chicks tossed into sub-zero conditions, because they would never lay eggs.
Want to avoid being cruel to chickens? Stop kidding yourself and don't eat eggs.
Slaughtering an animal for food isn't cruel IMO, but causing them harm that's easily avoidable is unethical, and reducing overall amount of suffering among living creatures is ethical.
I have no problem eating chickens, but i'd rather eat ones that weren't just non-caged, but were actually free-range and well looked after.
I agree, there's worse things than death which is inevitable, suffering isn't.
Jesus what a waste of chook, most people throw them in a big blender and feed them back to other chooks or dogs etc.
The price has nothing to do with the caged eggs. Its the cost of running the refrigerator at the supermarket to store them.
If only they stored them on the shelves how cheap could they be
Or better yet, lock the eggs in a cage at the supermarket and we could all be buying cheap ass caged eggs.
If only people read my ideas instead of click-bait news articles….if only…
Eggs aren’t stored in the refrigerator at the supermarkets I go to.
Unwashed eggs don't need to be in the fridge, only washed eggs. Japan has a special machine which cleans eggs and makes them safe to eat raw, but apparently they still need to be refrigerated. The eggs are pretty sparkling clean so I'm guessing they are washed. I know supermarkets used to sell eggs on the shelf but now that I think about it Colesworth have their eggs in the fridge these days.
My housemates don't refrigerate their eggs even though they do buy brands that are sold in fridge and I haven't told them that washed eggs need to be kept chilled, means more fridge space for me 😈
You can eat raw eggs without refrigeration, eggs are practically sterile straight from the bird.
Washing the eggs removes the natural hydrophobic film from the shell, thereafter they need to be refrigerated. Washing eggs creates the problem.
Of cause the expiry date is longer if kept in the fridge, but it isn't necessary for the supermarket to do so, I don't believe eggs are washed in Australia?
Washing the eggs removes the natural hydrophobic film from the shell, thereafter they need to be refrigerated
Someone tell that to all the local supermarkets in my area (including Woolies). They no longer refrigerate any eggs, and they're all washed.
I don't think it actually matters that much, they probably just last a bit longer when refrigerated. The problem is more when unwashed eggs are refrigerated, because when they condensate, that water can penetrate the egg and put some of the unwashed materials/bacteria inside it.
My woolworths does not keep their eggs in the fridge, pretty evident at times they are unwashed
Maybe the ones around me in Adelaide do it because it’s what customers expect. Or “just in case”. Or with all the different brands in SA some are washed and some aren’t so they put them all in the fridge. The eggs I buy look clean anyway, never seen any chicken shit on them.
It has nothing to do with the refrigerator too. Non refrigerated eggs sold in the farmers markets are much more expensive than the refrigerated eggs in the supermarkets.
But lots of things at a farmers market are much more expensive than in the supermarkets, though often (not always) better quality. Selling through farmer's markets is an inherently high-cost way of distributing fresh produce because you can't rely on supply matching demand (ie there's a lack of scale economies in both).
Can I afford eggs at the market? Are my friends gonna die in the plague? Puritans coming for my sinful lifestyle. I want some modern problems. Modern problems.
They say this but not all egg markets in Australia are the same. Last time there was an 'egg crisis' SA had no problems given the number of producers vs population.
And really, how many eggs do people eat (and will it hurt not to for a while)?
Four eggs a day, every day. Three egg omelette and one egg for waffles/other baking. Sometimes I have two omelettes.
But you're in SA, so between Rohdes, Days, KI and Barossa eggs, I doubt we'll suffer.
Yeah so many brands to choose from at Woolies. You really need to stand there studying them all for a few minutes to figure out the cheapest per gram.
You really need to stand there studying them all for a few minutes
usually just need to buy the ones with the least colourful packaging.
Shh let everyone else thing eggs give you heart disease, we don't want to drive up demand for them now!
Forget it, idonotknowwhy. While it has been proven that eggs contain cholesterol, it has not yet been scientifically concluded that they raise the level of serum cholesterol in the human bloodstream.
At the risk of ruffling feathers, have you seen Asian dishes? Literally an egg on top of nearly every one.
Personally I am lucky if I can use a dozen eggs before they expire.
That said, in WA the eggs have been in and out of stock since the start of the pandemic. Maybe the chickens don't like the heat…or maybe we just won't allow them to cross the borders
Make french toast to use them up, delicious.
or maybe we just won't allow them to cross the borders
It wouldn't be surprising if all of WAs eggs are produced locally. All fresh eggs sold in Australia are produced locally due to import regulations.
Usually between 2-4 per day for household, usually also end up getting between 2-4 per day from our chickens as well.
Currently to add an Egg to a Burger is $1.13 or $1.20 near me.*
*I wonder if I can just get the Egg without the Burger or bypass the Shop and negotiate direct with the Chicken.
Reminds me of the $100 lamb roast:
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/joyces-100-roast-pre…
People spout a lot of nonsense to try and scare the punters.
If eggs have to go up because caged chickens are banned than thats a good thing in my books.
from a moral standpoint, is it better to buy these caged eggs prior to them being written off by the supermarket, such that one puts them to better use than simply letting them be thrown away?
No doubt there will be a transition period to avoid that.
Ignore this sensationalist garbage.