The price of 30 eggs in Mozambique has soared after law enforcement agents seized over 360 000 eggs smuggled from Malawi.
Last week, the National Inspection of Economic Activities (INAE) seized the smuggled eggs in the city of Nampula sold at a cheaper price of 190 meticais per egg against the normal price of 230 meticais.
The raid has resulted in a serious a shortage of eggs with the price rising to 350 meticais per egg.
“We are selling an egg for 350 meticais, but even today (Tuesday) it will rise to 400 meticais,” one egg trader Alfane Momade, said.
Momade’s egg stock was also seized last week.
The operation last week followed a complaint filed by Novos Horizontes, a large-scale producer of broiler chickens and eggs located in Rapale, 20 kilometres from the city of Nampula.
This poultry company is currently selling eggs, but retailers say they don’t have enough stock to satisfy the local market.
“When we buy an egg at 280 meticais, we resell it at 300 meticais and have a margin of 20 meticais,” explained Anito Momade, another egg dealer in the city of Nampula.
Vendor Absinel Domingos said; “Malawian eggs are affordable, and we traders but at a reasonable price. The national egg is priced too high.”
However, a customer Dulce Armando stopped buying eggs as much as she required, because the price exceeded her expectations.
“I wanted to buy two ‘favos’ but I gave up and only bought one,” she said.
However, the provincial director of Industry and Commerce in Nampula said there was no crisis as there were enough eggs on the market.
“We currently have a stock of 531 000 eggs and, with this stock, the production we have and the production we see every day, there is no reason for there to be a shortage of eggs. What must be happening is hoarding by some merchants, just to be able to circumvent the rules guaranteeing a good business environment,” he says.
