Article Preview
TopIntroduction
Food remains a worldwide problem. Eggs are an important food product,but is also thought that they are often the food of pour countries ans excessive harmful to health. However eggs are a traditional food with a higher consumption per head even in economically developed countries with high living standard. 30% of egg sales goes to the production of processed egg products (liquid, frozen, powder) which are used as an integral part of food products. Besides use as a food source, eggs are also used for medical purposes, to produce numerous vaccines, based on biotechnology and medicines to fight cancer and other diseases.
During 2011 year the world consumtion of eggs per capita was 173 eggs (or 1,195 billion eggs worldwide) while in 2000 it was 157 eggs per capita (or 963 billion eggs). This is an increase of consumption with a higher rate in all regions of the world. Consumption of eggs in each country has been in relationship with the conditions of the economy namely GDP per capita (Best Peter, 2011).China dominates the egg industry with 36% of the general global production, while the other major producer is Mexico with a 34% of total production. These two countries have the highest consumption of eggs (Dreyer Jerry, 2011).
The US is regarded as the world's largest exporter of eggs and it is estimated that in 2014, 256 eggs will be produced for each member of the population - the highest rate of production in the past 8 years (American Egg Board, 2014).
The most consumption and production of eggs occurs in intensely populated region of Asia, where this protein serves as a great food. In this region there is a great variety in terms of production, processing and the price of eggs and egg products .This region consists of 16 countries and each country differs from each other in terms of culture, religion, welfare, feeding habits and so on. Another distinction of these countries is the level of industrial activity (Japan has the highest rate of processing eggs in powder and liquid, while Thailand has almost no processing and relies heavily on imports. It is clear that there are significant differences in egg prices across the region as a result of on feed, production methods, efficiency in production, domestic consumption or imports.
Singapore faces high costs due to the dependence of the import of eggs where the bulk is coming from Malaysia but also from Europe, India and USA. Japan is one of the largest importer of egg products in the world. Prices in Vietnam are higher due to the consumption and egg production system. It is interesting that in China the prices are low, despite the very high consumption of eggs in the country, where 90% of egg is consumed inside China, consuming 300 eggs per capita per year. However, there is no over-capacity in the market. Over 80% of Chinese egg production occurs in small scale production in the type of household or house yard .In India egg production costs are the lowest in the region due to the low food costs .Egg consumption in India is the lowest in the region only 50 per head per year.
Eggs and egg products are traded internationally. The price of eggs has an impact on sales. In the U.S. market price in 2011 was less favorable than the price in 2010 and in The EU egg price was the lowest in recent years (Best Peter, 2011). There is a high level of egg trade within the EU countries. It is interesting to note that there is a significant amount of eggs and egg products from Azia to western countries. This is in large part due to the low level of industrialization, control and processing contemporary. For this reason commercial parts mainly occur within Asian countries
Japan, Korea, the Philippines and Hong Kong import from the US, EU and India frozen liquid egg and egg powder products, while Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia imports only from these countries egg powder.It makes more sens for liquid egg products to be produced domestically or imported from neighboring countries (in Asia). But the problem is price competition.US and EU eggs producers have lower prices compared to the most Asian countries. It is interesting that the US and EU prices are at the same level (low) as prices in India (so it will be very difficult for Malaesia, for example to compete with its products which are for 65 cents per kg higher than the prices of the same products in the EU and US).