Brake on egg growth

With increased productivity per layer, global hen egg production in 2006 of an estimated 61.1 million tonnes is 35 percent greater than 10 years earlier, when the provisional figure of layer numbers at 5726 million, has risen by just 30 percent. While the available figures point to virtually no increase in layer numbers in 2006 over 2005, egg output is calculated to have risen by 1.5 million tonnes or 2. 5 percent.

Reliability of the FAO estimates depends on the availability of official figures as well as the accuracy of the information on which the estimates are based. Errors will vary and could range as widely as plus or minus 20 ⁶⁰ percent in poor, less-developed countries, to plus or minus 5 percent in developed ₅₀ economies. Regional aggregations include estimates for missing figures.

Of the 5726 million laying hens in 2006 ⁴⁰
some 3546m or nearly 62 percent were in
Asia, an increase in this region’s market ₃₀
share of around 3 percent since 1996.
Growth forecast for 2015

A report by Professor Hans-Wilhelm Windhorst, statistical analyst for the International Egg Commission, says that by 2015 egg demand will increase by 12 million tonnes over the 2005 level of 59mt. The intriguing question here is where will these extra eggs be produced?

The same countries occupied the top 10 positions in 2006 as in 2005. However, there were two positional changes as the recovery in the Russian Federation has continued, pushing this country up into fifth position displacing Mexico. A little lower down, Indonesia and France changed positions as Indonesia climbed to eighth.

World hen egg production⁺ (million tonnes)

70

Output increase slips

Over the past decade hen egg output (including hatching eggs) has grown by an average of just over 1.5mt or 3 percent a year. While the annual increases in volume shows little movement around the 1.5mt figure, in percentage terms the gains, which averaged 3. 5 percent between 1996 and 2002, have since slipped to 2. 5 percent a year and seems likely to contract further.

Not surprisingly, the fastest growing region is Asia, where egg output has risen by around 4 percent a year from 25.1mt back in 1996 to the 2006 estimate of 37.2mt. As a result, Asia now accounts for almost 61 percent of world egg production compared with less than 56 percent ten years ago.

In contrast, Europe’s egg industry expanded by less than 1 percent a year since 1996, output rising from 9.2mt to 10.0mt, while its share of the global total has declined from more than 20 percent to a little over 16 percent. Forecast is for further contraction to around 14 percent by 2015.

Industry expansion in the Northern
America and Oceania areas is no more than
2 percent a year and their shares of the
world total will continue to contract.

In Africa, and FAO’s newly defined Latin America region (Latin America, Central America and the Caribbean), egg production over the past decade has increased at 3 percent a year and both have managed to maintain their shares of world output.

20

10

0

1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006

Global hen egg production in 2006 is estimated at 61.1 million tonnes, 35 percent greater than 10 years earlier.

Regional egg production⁺ (million tonnes)

40

35

Source: FAO

30

25

20

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

15

10

5

0

Africa Asia Europe

✝ Includes hatching eggs in some instances

Latin America, Central America and the Caribbean

Latin America* N. America Oceania

In Africa and Latin America (Latin America, Central America and the Caribbean), egg production over the past decade has increased at 3 percent a year.