BEIC says no to egg stamping

As reported in last month's issue of The Ranger, there has been mounting speculation within the industry that on-farm egg stamping was about to be introduced into the Lion Code.

However, it is now known that the BEIC has decided against making this a requirement – for the time being at least. This will come as a relief to those producers who were less than enthusiastic at the prospect of having to invest in a piece of equipment that

could be expensive to install and would thereafter continue to add to their production costs in terms of printer consumables and labour.

For smaller units where eggs are hand packed, ongoing labour costs

were a prime concern; whilst at the other end of the scale, large

producers whose needs would be best met by sophisticated, fully

automated stamping equipment were facing significant capital expenditure.

So although many people in the industry support on-farm stamping in principle, its benefits would have to be weighed very carefully against the costs of implementing such a scheme

across the industry – particularly at the present time when producers are struggling to meet unprecedented rises in feed costs.

The arguments in favour of on-farm stamping are summarised in the

following statement from Noble Foods: 'Noble Foods support Farm Stamping as a positive way forward for the egg industry, especially given the challenges which the whole industry has faced during the last 12 months on integrity of egg sourcing and the need for greater traceability. Farm stamping would boost the overall credibility of the industry among both retail customers and end consumers and would be a major step change

for the future.'

BEIC points out that following the allegations of free range fraud made last November, the Lion Code has now been further strengthened by the introduction of a number of measures

to reduce the possibility of fraud in the future. The decision not to make on-farm stamping part of the Lion Code was made after considering a report by a working group of both packers and producer representatives, set up by BEIC, with their remit being

to look at the feasibility of moving to on-farm marking of eggs.

The cost of equipment was one of the factors investigated by the

working group. It was noted that there is now a wide range of

equipment available, ranging from manual single egg printers to 30 egg printers. The cost of equipment varies with the degree of automation and throughput. The working group had the opportunity to view various machines at a practical demonstration, some of which were subsequently trialled by a number of

producers.

Finn Cottle (Marketing Director, Noble Foods) commented: "We know that there is a significant cost, potentially £3-4m attached to this change. Given the current difficult economic circumstances for farmers, we would not recommend adding any extra financial burden at this time. It is important that we focus on improving

farmer returns in the short to medium term in order to guarantee the long term sustainability of this industry. As a business, we will pursue this development further when the time is right and we have resolved the current economic situation for our

producers." Mark Williams, of BEIC, said: "It would be fair to say that the working group looked very closely at the advantages

and disadvantages of on-farm marking of eggs, and in their report

presented a balanced view. After much discussion, it was decided that due to the huge increases in feed prices affecting producers, there would not, at the current time, be a requirement to mark eggs on-farm." He added that the situation would be

kept under review.