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The price of eggs has skyrocketed in recent months, up 138% year-over-year last month. A dozen eggs now averages about $4.25, due in part to avian flu, which is tearing through poultry farms across the U.S.—wiping out some 58 million birds in the last year.
But there’s another culprit, says a farm advocacy group: price gouging. America’s largest egg producer saw a 600% jump in profits in the last quarter alone.
Farm Action, a nonprofit that campaigns against corporate influence in the farm industry, alleged in a letter to Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan on Thursday that Mississippi-based Cal-Maine Foods is engaging in “apparent price gouging, price coordination, and other unfair or deceptive acts or practices” as Americans pay more than ever for the staple ingredient.
Farm Action claims the “real culprit” behind the massive price increases is “a collusive scheme among industry leaders to turn inflationary conditions and an avian flu outbreak into an opportunity to extract egregious profits.”
Cal-Maine Foods, which controls 20% of the retail egg market, reported quarterly sales up 110% and gross profits up more than 600% over the same quarter in the prior fiscal year, according to a December filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The company pointed to decreased egg supply nationwide due to avian flu as the reason for higher prices and record sales. Cal-Maine brands include Egg-Land’s Best, Farmhouse Eggs, and Land O’ Lakes eggs.
The company has had no positive avian flu tests on any of its farms, according to its quarterly report. Cal-Maine did not respond to a request for comment.
“Avian flu is not manufactured—it’s real,” says Joe Maxwell, the co-founder of Farm Action. “But the dominant firms are using that…
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