Via The Gleaner in Jamaica, a report by The Associated Press: Egg hunting - Prices soar as Mexicans face shortage of eggs. Excerpt:
The Mexican government is battling an egg shortage and hoarding that have caused prices to spike in a country with the highest per-capita egg consumption on Earth.
A summer epidemic of bird flu in the heart of Mexico's egg industry has doubled the cost of a kilo (2.2 pounds), or about 13 eggs, to more than 40 pesos (US$3), a major blow to working- and middle-class consumers in a country that consumes more than 350 eggs per person each year.
Egg prices have dominated the headlines here for a week, spurring Mexico City's mayor to ship tons of cheap eggs to poor neighbourhoods and the federal government to announce emergency programmes to get fresh chickens to farms hit by bird flu and to restock supermarket shelves with eggs imported from the United States and Central America.
The national dismay over egg prices has revealed the unappreciated importance of a cheap, easy source of protein that's nearly as important to Mexican kitchens as tortillas, rice and beans.
