During his Rosentuin address that announced on Wednesday on Wednesday radical new global rates that were aimed at reducing the dependence on America of imports, President Trump took a few rhetorical detours to praise the recent work of his administration to lower the price of eggs.
“They went through heaven, the egg prizes. They went through the air and you did fantastic work,” he told the Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins, who was in the audience.
In the middle of a speech about trade protection, the apart from a somewhat ironic: many of Rollins's efforts have in fact has the import of less expensive eggs from countries that are now confronted with higher rates to illuminate the domestic supply crisis that rises for the supermarket.
More information: What Trump's rates mean for the economy and your wallet
In February, Rollins announced an action plan of $ 1 billion for bringing egg costs under control, which largely consisted of long -term policy initiatives aimed at combating the bird flu that chicken herds has decimated. These include new biosafility measures, such as sending epidemiologists to advise farmers on health risks on their farms; exploring new bird vaccines; And the removal of regulatory loads that impede the production of eggs.
Rollins' most important short -term movement, however, was to start importing more eggs on a temporary basis. At the end of March, Rollins announced that the administration would start purchases from South Korea and Turkey. Polish and Lithuanian officials also said they had been approached by the administration.
“We talk in the hundreds of millions of eggs for the short term,” said Rollins. “And when our chicken populations are populated again, and we have a full egg-empty industry going again in a few months, we then switch back to our internal egg layers and we move those eggs on the plank.”
During his speech, Trump said that the prices had fallen more than half, thanks to Rollins's work. According to experts, that can only be half true.
Since the first week of March, the wholesale costs of white eggs have fallen by around 56% to $ 3 per dozen, according to the weekly data from the Department of Agriculture. However, the decrease is probably less to do with the work of the administration than with a decrease in the demand from consumers that have been invested by the steep price of an omelette, said David Anderson, a professor in the agricultural economy at Texas A & M University.
“I think the efforts of the administration on the egg front are good movements,” he said. “But I think they are more long -term boosts in nature.”
