Chicken and egg prices multiply; both are disappearing from household tables

The production cost of chicken and eggs in Iran has risen "several times over" with the jump in the exchange rate against the rial, and output of these two staples has fallen over the past 10 months. Hamidreza Kashani, head of the Central Union of Mihan Poultry Farmers, blames the removal of the preferential exchange rate, the lack of working capital and the absence of guaranteed government purchases.

According to Ehsan Nouri, a member of the Association of Animal Feed, Poultry and Aquatic Industries, the price of a tray of eggs weighing about two kilograms has risen from 100,000–150,000 tomans to 470,000–480,000 tomans. He estimates that egg prices have risen by about 220 percent over the past year, nearly double the figure announced by the Islamic Republic's Statistical Centre. He said these products are "gradually being removed from the household basket".

Imported feed and a cash shortage

Iran's poultry farms depend on imported feed. Peyman Falsafi, a member of parliament's agriculture committee, has said that 90 percent of chicken meat production depends on imported inputs. According to Nouri, the price of a kilogram of soybean meal has risen from about 20,000 tomans to about 100,000 tomans and corn from 11,000–12,000 tomans to more than 50,000 tomans, while only half of the country's feed-mill capacity is active. Majid Movafegh Ghadiri, head of the same association, said on 13 October that since the 28,500-toman exchange rate was abolished, a shortage of cash has become poultry farmers' main problem.

Even the Islamic Republic's official statistics do not hide the severity of the price rises: according to the Statistical Centre, meat prices in September this year were more than 115 percent higher than in September last year, and the prices of milk, cheese and eggs nearly 119 percent higher.

Shrinking tables

The rise in the price of chicken and eggs, the cheapest sources of protein for most families, comes as the World Bank forecasts that 74 percent inflation will push millions more Iranians below the poverty line and a former labour minister of the Islamic Republic says the economy's only problem is "high prices and inflation".

A tray of eggs has gone from about 150,000 tomans to nearly 480,000 tomans in a year.