Egg prices in the US are so high people are smuggling eggs across the border from Mexico

There is a reason 81% to Americans paying attention to the price of eggs at their local grocery store: Although US inflation in general appears to be slowing, eggs continue to pick up. more and more expensive, and some people shop at cheaper supermarkets. In some cases, they even go to another country.

A carton of a dozen eggs in the US cost an average of $4.25 in December, a 137% increase last year. And the price of eggs increased by 11.1% in December compared to the previous month. If prices go up like that, shoppers will likely look for alternatives. So it’s no surprise that the number of eggs stuck at the US-Mexico border has increased in recent months.

“We’ve seen an increase in people trying to cross the eggs from Juárez to El Paso because it’s cheaper in Mexico than in the US,” said Roger Maier, a public affairs officer at the office. of Customs and Border Protection. luckand added that other points of entry in the Southwest have seen similar increases in undeclared crossings related to poultry.

In the last few months, the US has finally had some good news of inflation. Shipping costs have refusedprices of some food products including beef fell, and the stores were offered discounts and deals during the holiday season. But through it all, egg prices remain stubbornly high as a lack of domestic supply means shoppers in many parts of the country they can’t even be found on the shelves of their grocery store.

For more and more shoppers, the solution lies across the border.

Egg encounters are increasing

There were 2,002 border seizures involving eggs between Nov. 1 and Jan. 17, according to CBP data, a 336% increase over the same period a year earlier.

For health reasons, CBP forbade undeclared arrival of poultry products including eggs, and released a statement Friday urging travelers not to bring raw eggs and poultry products across the border. Smugglers who fail to declare prohibited eggs and poultry items are liable for a $10,000 fine, Jennifer De La O, director of field operations for CBP in San Diego, wrote in a tweet last week.

Such a large fine usually means the prohibited goods are brought into the US for resale, according to CBP regulations. CBP imposes fines up to $1,000 if undeclared prohibited goods enter the US for non-commercial use, but if officials are able to confirm otherwise, fines may be imposed at a “higher rate.”

Maier said that most of the trapped eggs were confiscated during the primary inspections, where people can leave the items with impunity. These instances “are not necessarily smuggling,” he said, but he added that last week there was a “very small number of cases” where the eggs were not declared but were later discovered, leaving the perpetrators behind. with heavy fines.

US sales margins for eggs purchased in Mexico are significant. A kilo—a little more than a dozen large eggs—is the cost between $1.70 and $2.20 last week in Guadalajara, Mexico’s second largest city, according to Mexican government data. In the US, a dozen large eggs cost an average slightly more than $4 Last month. Shoppers in San Ysidro, a district of San Diego bordering Mexico, reportedly turned up their noses at high egg prices and went to buy eggs in Mexico, store owners said. told the BBC last week.

CBP prevents the undeclared arrival of eggs and other poultry products in the US as a guardrail against diseases, especially avian influenza or bird flu, an epidemic that spread in the US last year and may be primarily responsible for the egg shortages and high prices that drove people to jump to Mexico to shop in the first place.

The flu epidemic is directly responsible for the lack of domestic supply of eggs in the US and the high prices.

The disease led to the infusion of 44 million laying hens in the US, according to the Department of Agriculture, which said last week that the domestic egg supply fell by 7.5% month over month since February. The USDA said in a report Friday that price pressures have eased somewhat from December highs, but due to ongoing supply constraints, costs remain at “unsatisfactory levels.”

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