Sarthe.How the company LEUF manages a special year

How is the egg sector doing?"We are facing a cyclical crisis," says Christophe Bériard, director of the Lœuf company, based in Bazoge (Sarthe).He is answering our questions.

How do you analyze, economically, the last eighteen months experienced by your company Luef (1)?

If we replace ourselves in a more general context, we can say that with COVVID, we have known a special year for the egg sector.In 2020, we knew a few months record for the entire sector since it was necessary to provide all of France, which represents for the entire sector some 80 million eggs.Overall, with us, it went very well, the staff responded.We considered that it was a happy new year.

The deconfination arrives.In 2021, there is a significant drop in consumption that we clearly feel from February-March.At the end of July, the egg and egg -produced market experienced a 9 %drop, which is quite worrying.

How do you explain this rapid development of consumption?

This is explained by the greatest presence of people in their interior at the time of containment, associated with the increasing place made in the kitchen, carried by TV emissions, the media in general, the egg beingA magical product to be used in the kitchen, a fridge background product, which can be kept for a long time.The egg was really acclaimed during this period of domestic presence.

And today, would you say that your sector is in crisis?

In fact, this sagging of consumption was coupled, at the end of 2020, to an outbreak of the price of raw materials: cereals, essential food of hens, experienced an increase of 27 %.However, cereals count for 60 % at cost price, which represents 7 % impact for us.

We are clearly in a situation of economic crisis.Indeed, the sector is indexed, that is to say that to protect breeders, the more the price of the material increases, the more expensive eggs are bought.

Today, we are in a situation where we buy eggs much more expensive but we do not sell more dear to mass distribution.To this are added some difficulties in supplying raw materials, such as SOJ without GMOs that we need in our formulations because it is very rich in protein.

Despite everything, the company remains solid.We consider that it is a fleeting crisis, as we have known in the past, ten years ago.Punctually.We are faced with a cyclical crisis.

(1) The company LEUF is a common subsidiary of the Loué farmers and the LDC Voalailler group.The bazoge platform conditions the praise eggs.