The Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) yesterday said increased demand for eggs during the holidays could push their prices up.
BAI also noted local supply of pork needs to be augmented by imports.
Lani Plata Cerna, BAI supervising science research specialist of livestock research and development, said at the Laging Handa public briefing yesterday supply of eggs in the last quarter of the year is sufficient and prices are stable at P7 per piece for medium-sized ones
“Like other food items, there is an expected increase in demand for eggs especially for bread, cakes and other pastries… during the holidays. If demand will increase and not met by local supply, there is a possibility that its price will increase. However, based on our egg supply outlook, its supply will be sufficient until the end of the year with a sufficiency level of 112 percent,” Cerna said.
Cerna said based on data from the Department of Agriculture (DA), as of October 2022, supply outlook of pork for the last quarter is at 95 percent sufficiency level compared to third quarter 2022’s 121 percent.
Cerna said the government continues its repopulation efforts to help local raisers recover from the effects of African swine fever.
He added frozen meat imports mostly from the US will also help plug the deficiency for the quarter.
Based on data from the BAI, a total of 545.21 million kg of imported pork entered the country from January to September this year. Of that, 20.63 million kg came from the US, equivalent to 3.8 percent of the total volume.
DA monitoring of public markets in the National Capital Region yesterday showed the prevailing price of pork kasim is at P300 per kg as pork liempo is at P360 per kg.
