Thais urged to consume more chicken eggs

BANGKOK, July 13 (TNA) - Thai people are urged to consume more chicken eggs, targeted at 300 eggs per head per year by 2018. Mongkol Pipatsatayanuwo, President of Thailand's Association of Hen-Eggs Farmers, Traders and Exporters, told journalists on Wednesday that his association and chicken-egg farm members have jointly launched a market campaign on promoting public consumption of 300 chicken eggs per head per year under a strategic concept of "consume chicken eggs everyday, every age and every menu" for 2015-2018. Mongkol said the market campaign is aimed to raise domestic consumption of chicken eggs from 220 eggs per head per year now, compared to 340 chicken eggs per head per year in China, 330 eggs per head per year in Japan, 300 eggs per head per year in Malaysia and 290 eggs per head per year in the United States. Mongkol pointed out that Thailand currently produces 15,500 chicken eggs annually on average, worth over 50 billion baht yearly, while domestic consumption of chicken eggs has grown by 4 per cent annually on average and the prices of Thai chicken eggs have been vulnerable due to oversupply, causing losses and even the permanent closure of some chicken-egg farms. Mongkol affirmed that his member chicken-egg farms are ready to increase their production capacity to be in line with market demand, expected to rise by 21,000 eggs annually on average if the ongoing campaign is successful, which should make the prices of chicken eggs become more stable in the same direction of more well-being of local producers of chicken eggs. The association's president acknowledged, however, that the domestic prices of chicken eggs have kept rising since March 2016 and there is now no problem of oversupply due to seasonal drought and increased demand, especially among children, during the last school term. According to the association's chief, the price of mixed-size chicken eggs now stands at 3.20 baht per egg on average, while the production costs stand at about 2.90 baht per egg, and the price is foreseen to become generally stable in the second half of this year. Meanwhile, Sombat Thiratrakulchai, Chair of the Board of Trade of Thailand's Livestocks Committee, cited a research project of US-based Harvard University as saying that consuming one chicken egg daily should not cause the coronary disease and healthy people could consume six chicken eggs per head per week without negative effects, like the coronary disease and cerebrovascular disorders, except people in health-risk groups like diabetes patients. (TNA)