SEOUL: South Korean egg importers on Friday criticised the government’s plans to subsidise the cost of fresh egg imports to alleviate a shortage caused by the country’s worst-ever bird flu outbreak as insufficient and too late to meet upcoming holiday demand. South Korea will spend 900 million won ($758,000) to support shipment costs for eggs imported by air and ship through the end of February, the agriculture ministry said in a statement on Friday. For air shipment the government would cover up to 1 million won ($841.26) per tonne and 90,000 won per tonne for ship transport, the ministry said. The eggs will take about seven days to arrive by air and roughly 21 days by ship.
South Korea’s government announced the plan as Asia’s fourth-largest economy suffers through its worst bird flu outbreak. More than 30 million birds, most of them egg-laying hens, have been culled because of the outbreak, causing the shortage. However, importers said the subsidy will not cover the increased costs and is too late to fix the shortfall ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday when egg demand peaks. Im Jeong Kyun, a director at JW Companys Inc, who is looking to import eggs from the United States, said his air shipment costs are 2.75 million won and the 1 million won subsidy will not even cover half of his costs.
“The government announced it would cover half of the shipping fees, but unlike the government announcement it’s saying it will only support about 36.7 percent,” Im said. If the government can only subsidise a third of the costs, imports may not be feasible, said Im, who had asked for a full subsidy from the government. Ha Do-Bong, director of the Korea Egg Distribution Association, also said the government’s measure was insufficient and late to relieve the egg shortage the Lunar New Year at the end of January. “But like it or not, importing eggs is the only option to increase supplies,” Ha said. With the government subsidy, the retail price of an imported egg from the U.S. should be between 290 won to 310 won, including shipping fees, an agriculture ministry spokesman said. Korea’s average retail price of 30 eggs was 8,807 won as of Thursday, or 293.6 won per egg, according to state-run Korea Agro-Fisheries & Food Trade Corp.
