egg products market

The egg industry continues to change and evolve quickly due to increased demand, technology changes and pressures from consumers and government regulators. Also as environmental concerns grow, the egg industry will continue to grow as the egg offers consumers a source of protein with the least environmental impact. Shell egg production and consumption continues to grow in most countries around the world as international trade is relatively insignificant with some exceptions - mainly in the EU. Demand for processed egg products continues to increase and these products will enjoy a larger amount of international trade in the future.

Materials & Methods

As reliable and complete statistics are not available on a global basis, several databases referenced in the Bibliography were used to prepare the materials analyzed. The IEC maintains the most reliable data as submitted in a standardized form by rapporteurs from member countries. For the countries or data not reported by the IEC, other databases used include EUROSTAT, FAO and Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística.

Results & Discussion

An amazing 36% of the global egg production is found in China alone with over 70% of the global production concentrated in the top ten countries of China, USA, India, Japan, Mexico, Russian Federation, Brasil, Indonesia, France and Turkey (Chart 1). Latin America produces almost 11% of the world's eggs with Mexico registering over 1/3 of the Latin production (Chart 2). Argentina and Colombia are also included in the top 25 global markets.

To add some perspective on these numbers it's interesting to study the change from the year 2000 to 2009 in these markets. In the top 10 global markets, impressive growth over those nine years was seen in India and Indonesia (66%/65%) (Chart 3). Both Mexico and Brazil increased 1/3 (33%/32%). The largest volume growth was seen in the two largest producers - China with over 4 million tons and the US with 1 million tons. Only in the EU was there no growth with Germany falling from the top 10 and production in France was stagnant. The impact of the new housing legislation in the EU will continue to shift production to markets with lower cost of production and represents an interesting market opportunity for egg products exporters.

Growth in Latin America from 2000 to 2009 was almost 2 million tons - a total of 40% (Chart 4). This is almost double of the growth in the United States during the same period and almost half of the growth in China! Those impressive numbers demonstrate a commitment by the Latin American industry to invest in an effort to more efficiently produce eggs and egg products to meet the growing demands for local consumption.

Chart 1

Top 10 global egg production in 2009 total 64,315,393 - tons ^{1, 2, 3, 4}
China	23,654,000
U.S.A.	5,928,165
India	3,348,438
Japan	2,912,277
Mexico	2,383,744
Russian Federation	2,067,000
Brasil	1,922,000
Indonesia	1,059,270
France	918,000
Turkey	880,000

Chart 3

Comparison of egg production in top global markets - 1000 tons ^{1, 2, 3, 4}
	2000	2009	Change
China	19,433	23,654	22%
US	4,998	5,928	19%
Japan	2,535	2,912	15%
India	2,015	3,348	66%
Russia	1,895	2,067	9%
Mexico	1,788	2,384	33%
Brasil	1,509	1,992	32%
France	1,038	1,042	0%
Germany	901	881	-2%
Turkey	810	880	9%
Indonesia	642	1,059	65%

The increase of production in Mexico and Brasil represented over 50% of the Latin American growth. Other significant growth was seen in Argentina where production almost doubled. Colombia, Peru, Paraguay, Guatemala, the Dominican Republic, Bolivia and Panama all increased production over 50%.

Chart 2

Latin America egg production in 2009 total 6,991,597 tons ^{1, 2, 4}
Country	Production in Tons	Global Ranking
Mexico	2,383,744	5
Brasil	1,922,000	7
Argentina	643,066	16
Colombia	580,904	22
Peru	268,707	33
Venezuela	160,000	42
Chile	137,000	48
Paraguay	127,619	49
Guatemala	127,224	50
Cuba	106,779	53
Ecuador	93,587	56
Dominican Republic	91,932	58
Bolivia	68,600	65
El Salvador	64,250	67
Uruguay	54,000	74
Costa Rica	51,720	77
Honduras	51,313	78
Panama	23,938	100
Nicaragua	23,221	104
Puerto Rico	11,993	120

While some published data indicates China is the world leader in per capita egg consumption, most industry insiders agree with the IEC number of 344 eggs per capita (Chart 5). So Mexico is the world leader in 2009 with 355 eggs per capita. Japan is the other country above 300. We can also see some regional patterns emerge as we note high consumption in Hungary, Ukraine and the Czech Republic. While production has grown 66% in India over the past 9 years (Chart 3), the consumption remains at only 51 eggs per person. With over 1.2 billion citizens, a small increase in demand has a very large impact on supply.

It is most interesting to study the shell egg equivalent of egg products for those countries that report this statistic. In the US and EU over 30% of the production is consumed as processed egg products. Other countries are also showing increased production of processed eggs, indicating both growing domestic and export markets.

Chart 4

Comparison of egg production in Latin America tons ^{1, 2, 4}
	2000	2009	Change
Mexico	1,787,940	2,383,744	33%
Brasil	1,509,464	1,922,000	27%
Argentina	326,935	643,066	97%
Colombia	322,002	580,904	80%
Peru	162,280	268,707	66%
Venezuela	174,620	160,000	-8%
Chile	109,755	137,000	25%
Paraguay	67,609	127,619	89%
Guatemala	81,000	127,224	57%
Cuba	75,751	106,779	41%
Ecuador	72,150	93,587	30%
Dominican Republic	58,700	91,932	57%
Bolivia	38,935	68,600	76%
El Salvador	61,278	64,250	5%
Uruguay	37,000	54,000	46%
Costa Rica	40,958	51,720	26%
Honduras	41,241	51,313	24%
Panama	12,380	23,938	93%
Nicaragua	19,706	23,221	18%
Puerto Rico	8,877	11,993	35%
Total	5,008,581	6,991,597	40%

Chart 5

Per capita egg consumption of selected countries 2009^{1, 2, 3, 4}
	Total Eggs	Shell Eggs	Egg Products
Mexico	355
China	344	304	40
Japan	325	260	65
Hungary	261
Ukraine	260
Czech	258
France	248	172	76
USA	246	172	74
UAE	242	121	121
Colombia	215
Italy	215	150	65
Spain	214	171	43
Argentina	210	197	13
Sweden	201	163	38
Australia	194
Canada	193	148	45
United Kingdom	189	149	40
Switzerland	187	120	67
Netherlands	184	141	43
Belgium	184	92	92
Turkey	177	174	3
Ireland	165	150	15
Finland	164	142	22
Iran	155	150	5
Guatemala	148	147	1
Greece	139	127	12
South Africa	130	123	7
Brazil	125	118	7
India	51

Chart 6

Consumo huevo per cápita en América Latina ^{5, 6}
México	354
Colombia	230
Argentina	222
El Salvador	178
Chile	176
Guatemala	173
Costa Rica	156
Perú	140
Ecuador	138
Honduras	133
Venezuela	132
Brasil	131
Panamá	122
Bolivia	116
Nicaragua	90

The data in Chart 6 for Latin America are recent reports gathered in 2010 and 2011 so vary a bit from the 2009 IEC report. The impact of regional cuisine is noted as well as the impact of local economic challenges.

Chart 7

In Chart 7, we see that consumption has changed very little in Brazil from 2003 to 2010. However, Mexico has steady growth, while both Argentina and Colombia have significant growth.

A review of global and Latin American trade of imports and exports of shell eggs, dried eggs and liquid eggs will also be presented, but due to space limitations are not included in this written paper.

Conclusions

The global egg industry is dominated by China with over 36% of the egg production and extremely high internal consumption. In Latin America, Mexico produces 34% of the eggs with equally high internal consumption. Around the world the egg industry is growing at an extremely fast rate as the product's benefits are recognized and trade increases. Animal welfare legislation in the EU is showing a dramatic impact on local production and those countries are key markets in the trade of all egg products.

The largest trade of eggs currently takes place within the EU with all products passing freely from country to country. As local production costs continue to increase due to implementation of welfare compliant housing, countries with less expensive sources of labor and feed will continue to increase their participation in the EU market. Already India has made some significant gains in capturing EU market-share of dried egg products. Industry sources acknowledge that quality from India continues to be a concern, representing an opportunity for other low-cost producers to gain access with high-quality processed products to this attractive market.

Bibliography

European Commission, EUROSTAT.2011. URL: http://appsso.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/nui/show.do?dataset=apro_ec_bal&lang=en Acceso:11-Jul-2011.
Foreign Agricultural Organization of the United Nations, FAOSTAT. 2010.URL: http://faostat.fao.org/site/569/default.aspx#ancor Acceso:11-Jul-2011.
Foreign Agricultural Organization of the United Nations, FAOSTAT. 2010.URL: http://faostat.fao.org/site/535/default.aspx#ancor Acceso:11-Jul-2011.
Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística. 2011.www.ibge.gov.br/english/estatistica/economia/agropecuaria/censoagro/default.shtm Acceso:11-Jul-2011.
International Egg Commission. 2010. The Egg Industry 2010 A Global View.
Portela, F. Personal Communication.