President Donald Trump spoke about the higher egg prices during his address before Congress earlier this week.
“The egg prices are out of control, and we’re working hard to get it back down. Secretary, do a good job on that. You inherited a mess from the previous administration. Do a good job,” said President Trump, referencing USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins during his address.
The U.S. poultry industry has already lost nearly 28 million layers to depopulation in the first months of 2025 alone, because of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). The USDA estimates that about 156 million birds, across a variety of commercial operations and backyard flocks in the U.S. and Puerto Rico, have been lost as a result of HPAI since 2022.
USDA has announced a $1-billion mitigation program for HPAI in poultry. However, normalizing poultry and egg production is also important to grain producers, and they are hopeful a new strategy will be effective.
"[We are] encouraged by the plan that was just announced by Secretary Rollins and hopeful that will begin to arrest this problem and put these concerns for Americans and America’s corn farmers to rest,” said Neil Caskey, CEO of the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA).
Meanwhile, American Soybean Association CEO, Steve Censky, dealt with bird flu while serving as Deputy Ag Secretary during the first Trump administration. He says the virus has become more virulent.
“We’ve been trying depopulation (in poultry), and that’s been the standard approach that we’ve used on it. Obviously, it doesn’t seem to be an effective strategy. It doesn’t seem to be working on this for sure,” Censky said.
With no break from HPAI in the last 18 months, Censky said his organization welcomes a fresh approach. “The enhanced biosecurity measures that have been announced by Secretary Rollins, we’re supportive of that. I know, obviously, the vaccination program is a little trickier. The laying (poultry) industry wants it. The broiler industry is concerned. We just want to make sure that we don’t mess up our export markets for broilers.”
Both the corn and soybean industries are anxious for a stop-gap measure, because poultry is their top customer for corn and soybean meal.
“That sector is a big consumer of corn,” Censky said, “and certainly, there is an impact. We don’t have an estimate right now of what that will be. Obviously, those birds have to be around to consume our corn.”
“Forty to 50 million birds, I mean, that’s a lot of birds that have been lost recently,” said Lucas Lensch, the CEO of the United Soybean Board. “That adds up to about 5% of our meal usage nationally.”
The loss of demand could be a headwind for corn and soybean prices if HPAI continues to be a problem.
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