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WHY THE U.S. CAN’T COUNT ITS CHICKENS BEFORE THEY HATCH
Outside of those heavily invested in Bitcoins and Johnny Manziel, few groups were as happy to see 2015 pass as those Americans who make their livings exporting eggs; last year became a minefield of devastating sales drops brought on by pathogens and politics. Laid an egg? Well, yes, but 10 percent fewer eggs than in 2014, which is why the industry is looking to rebound with a happy and healthy 2016—though they’d settle for healthy.
The reason for the disastrous 2015 had its roots in 2014 when, in December, a duck in Oregon tested positive for pathogenic avian influenza—bird flu. Within months some 50 countries had placed trade restrictions on American eggs and poultry. The biggest blow was China’s decision in January of 2015 to restrict all American eggs and poultry, a huge setback for the industry since the Chinese not only import a good deal of U.S. eggs—Hong Kong buys the most—but China is by far the largest importer of U.S. chicken feet.
The Chinese claim their actions are based on not only the health of their own poultry industry but their citizens, since several Chinese have tested positive for bird flu. U.S. officials are dubious. “China’s ban was politically motivated, that was obvious,” says Toby Moore of the USA Poultry & Egg Export Council, who pointed out that no American egg or poultry product has ever tested positive for the disease. “There was no scientific basis for the nationwide ban. A country with an abundance of caution may restrict exports from a particular state or an area around a particular farm, but for a single dead duck in Oregon to cause all exports of all U.S. poultry is just a bit beyond the pale.”
Controversy is nothing new regarding eggs; few foods have been such lightning rods for debate through the years, as the reputation of eggs has suffered cracks due to subjects such as cholesterol and salmonella. But the industry received a huge boost in 2000 when the American Heart Association revised its dietary guidelines and said it was fine for healthy adults to eat an egg a day. And why not? One large egg contains vitamins A, B12 and E as well as calcium, iron, potassium and zinc.
Before World War II most U.S. egg production came from farms with flocks of less than 400 hens. But as with farming, improved technology and consolidation has pushed small, usually family operations aside and large factory-like operations have become the norm. More than 80 percent of U.S. egg production comes from 63 egg-producing companies with flocks of at least 1 million hens. Seventeen of those companies actually have flocks of more than 5 million.
You’ll be forgiven if you believed the hardest part of shipping eggs was damaging the shells. Because of the ingenious design of the egg carton, differing takes on that design and various cushioning material, eggs are no more susceptible to damage in transit than other perishables.
You may be surprised to find out that the egg carton is barely 100 years old—invented in 1911—and that it was not created by an engineer but by Canadian newspaper editor Joseph Coyle. Interestingly, it was developed to solve a trade dispute of its time: A British Columbian hotel owner complaining that the eggs a local farmer delivered were often damaged.
Of course, much of U.S. egg exports are not moved in shells but in products such as dried egg powder, dried egg whites and yolks that will be used in the production of things such as mayonnaise.
Toby Moore says that while there is no clear cut difference between American eggs and those from other countries, there may be a reason that Hong Kong, Canada and United Arab Emirates—some of the biggest customers for American eggs—keep coming back for more. “One thing that affects eggs is what the chickens are fed,” he says. “Our chickens are fed soybean meal and corn. Asian countries, including China, have an abundance of fish meal that they feed to their chickens and you can taste it in their eggs. They taste fishy.”
“Fishy” is, of course, how U.S. producers feel about the Chinese ban on their goods. Moore says there is hope that heightened surveillance by the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service will quell fears around the world, especially in China. Then again, that heightened attention turned up yet another infected duck in Oregon in December of 2015, completing a kind of horribly anxious circle for the industry.
The finding is especially troubling since the U.S. egg and poultry industry has been practically disease-free with only a handful of such cases, the last in a single flock in Texas. Experts have determined that this strain was not produced in America but, rather, is the result of migratory birds who brought the disease from—wait for it—China.
