Egg Production Doubles Since 1990

Global egg production doubled between 1990 and 2005.1 By then, some 64 million tons of eggs were produced worldwide (less than 1 percent more than in 2004).2 (See Figure 1.) Today there are approximately 4.93 billion egg-laying hens in the world, each capable of producing up to 300 eggs per year.3 By 2015, world egg production is expected to reach 72 million tons, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).4

While egg production has increased in the United States, Japan, India, and Mexico over the past four decades, most of the growth has been due to a 10-fold increase in eggs in developing countries in response to rising incomes and growing populations.5 Between 1990 and 2005, China accounted for 64 percent of the growth in world egg production.6 By 2005 this one country produced nearly 44 percent of the world’s eggs—28.7 million tons—more than five times as many as the next largest producer.7 (See Figure 2.) And this trend is expected to continue, with output there predicted to rise by 23 percent by 2015.8

By 2000, developing countries in Asia were producing twice as many eggs as all industrial countries.9 Output in the United States grew 13 percent between 1995 and 2000, compared with 34 percent in China during the same period.10 And in some countries, such as the United Kingdom, Japan, Hungary, and Denmark, fewer eggs were produced in 2000 than in 1998.11 The growth rate throughout the industrial world between 1961 and 2000 was quite low: 1.6 percent.12 Over the next 15 years, egg production in the industrial world is expected to increase from 18 million to 20 million tons, due in part to food saturation and overconsumption.13

People in industrial countries eat about twice as many eggs as people in developing countries—approximately 226 eggs per person per year.14 Yet only 30 countries are seeing any growth in per capita egg consumption.15 Among these nations are China, Libya, Mexico, Colombia, Turkey, and India.16 Elsewhere, egg consumption is either stable or falling.17 FAO predicts that most future growth in egg consumption will occur in the developing world in places like China, where income and population patterns are still shifting.18

Most egg production in China has transitioned from traditional, scattered, backyard farms to large-scale integrated operations.19 While small farmers once produced most of the eggs for markets for local consumers, largescale, vertically integrated factory farming has become the norm. Producers now typically confine egg-laying hens in small wire “battery” cages stacked in rows in sheds that are the length of a football field.20 Indeed, nearly 60 percent of China’s egg production in 2005 was done on farms with more than 500 layers.21 Taiwan alone produced about 390,000 tons of eggs in 2005 on 1,400 facilities housing on average 40,000 birds each.22

Market concentration and industrial, intensive production methods like these have found favor among Chinese egg industry leaders.23 “Intensification promises to be the right track for China to follow to develop its poultry industry,” noted Hongge Wang, senior economic expert for animal husbandry at the China National Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Service in Beijing.24 The Chinese government has already developed policies to encourage this, such as subsidies for large-scale farms.25

These policies have troubling implications for the environment, human health, and animal welfare. The Chinese State Environmental Protection Administration reports that industrial animal farms have become a major source of pollution, with raw manure being dumped into rivers that are a source of drinking water.26 By 2002, Taihu Lake—a critical part of the Yangtze River delta—had become severely polluted with nitrogen and phosphorus from the untreated waste of industrial poultry farms.27

Avian influenza has ravaged much of the Asian poultry industry since 2003, with egg layer flocks often being more affected than broiler (meat chicken) flocks.28 During the first four months of 2006, a commercial layer chick in China on average cost 24¢, a 12.6-percent decrease from the same period in the preceding year due to bird flu–related market disruptions.29 In Thailand, efforts to stop the spread of avian flu led to the destruction of almost half of the country’s 30 million egg-laying hens between November 2003 and February 2004.30

The industrial-style, intensive confinement of egg-laying hens in Asia has been strongly implicated in the epidemic’s spread. The International Food Policy Research Institute notes that “the critical issue is the keeping [of] more and more animals in smaller and smaller spaces.”31 According to FAO, “once high-density industrial poultry areas become affected, infection can be explosively spread within the units, and the very high quantities of virus produced may be easily carried to other units, to humans, and into the environment.”32

In addition, the intensive production methods that have enabled the dramatic surge in global egg production fall far short of any reasonable standard for animal welfare. Most hens on factory-style farms around the world live their entire lives in battery cages that frustrate most of their basic natural behaviors, including spreading their wings, walking freely, and nesting.33 Due to growing consumer and governmental awareness of inherent animal welfare problems with the cage system, this production method is being phased out in the European Union.34 And a growing consumer movement in the United States is steadily encouraging better standards for the country’s 300 million egg-laying hens.35

Similar efforts are under way in Asia, but less regulated markets there have caused the factory farm egg industry to grow.36 As public support for intensive confinement practices begins to dwindle in the West, large-scale egg producers are looking to Asia, where they can conduct business with little interference from individuals and groups concerned about animal welfare and environmental impacts.37