Egg prices had fallen for four straight months as laying-hen numbers and production recovered, reaching their lowest level since March this month. The first detection of highly pathogenic avian influenza in domestic wild birds this winter has now added fresh uncertainty to that decline. The government has raised the nationwide alert to the highest level and strengthened quarantine measures to prevent the virus from reaching poultry farms.
A renewed outbreak at laying-hen farms could reduce egg supplies through large-scale culling, but no farm transmission or price rebound has been reported in the available evidence.