A laying hen farmer's hopes and heartfelt words

"These past two days egg prices have dropped a little, and they can sell for 5.3 to 5.4 yuan per jin." On August 28, Guo Wenguang, head of Longfeng Poultry Industry Co., Ltd. in Anyang City, Henan Province, happily told reporters that the chicken farm produces more than 3,000 jin of eggs a day, and customers usually place their orders two days in advance. With egg prices good recently, the company's daily profit is around 10,000 yuan.

Since April this year, egg prices in Henan Province have risen noticeably, showing a trend of continuous increase. The latest monitoring data from the Henan Provincial Animal Husbandry Bureau on August 26 show that the average price of eggs in Henan is 11.28 yuan per kilogram, up 5.52% from last week and up 13.32% from last month. Compared with the same period last year, egg prices have risen by 34.9%, the largest increase in nearly 3 years.

The breeding industry is high-risk and low-profit, especially for small-scale farms, which have poor ability to withstand risk. The annual profit is not much, but developing toward a larger scale faces many difficulties.

"From my more than ten years of experience, raising laying hens is still profitable on the whole, and for an ordinary rural family, the income is indeed considerable. But for a company, more than half of the money earned has to go to paying the interest on bank loans. If the market is sluggish, plus bank interest, then there is basically not much profit left. Now many big companies have started investing in the laying hen breeding industry. Although I have been in this business for many years, it is hard for me to compare with them in terms of capital strength," Guo Wenguang said.

Guo Wenguang has always been thinking about expanding the scale. "But you cannot expand the scale only when you see good market conditions; if you have the funds, do it at the right time." In his view, eggs are a food for the masses, and this line of work, raising laying hens, needs people to do it no matter when. "I have long regarded laying hen breeding as my own career." It is precisely because of this that he can find his position and grasp the rhythm amid the ups and downs of the market.

Based on his own breeding experience, Guo Wenguang analyzed that the laying hen market conditions this year and next year will not be too bad. However, as more and more capital is injected into the laying hen breeding industry, when the market has an oversupply of eggs, prices will fall. He always remains cautiously optimistic about good market conditions. Guo Wenguang believes that the most important thing in laying hen breeding is scientific management. In standardized chicken houses, attention is usually paid to ventilation to ensure the chickens have a good breeding environment; in summer, cooling equipment must be installed to keep the chicken house at a moderate temperature; now disinfection is done at least 3 times a week, and breeding follows epidemic prevention procedures, which both guards against outbreaks and ensures the quality and safety of eggs.

"I have also grown attached to this industry. In the process of doing it, I strive to do a good job on quality, make reliable products for society, and provide good raw materials for the food industry. I am responsible for my own eggs, and also responsible for consumers. As for my peers, generally the larger-scale farms strictly control quality," Guo Wenguang said.

Yang Jinhuai, chief animal husbandry engineer of Hua County, told reporters that the Hua County Animal Husbandry Bureau often invites provincial disease prevention experts to explain methods of disease prevention, every township has personnel responsible for epidemic prevention, and the whole county has selected 342 monitoring points for irregular monitoring.

"Market risks are hard to predict, but if insurance companies could join the breeding industry, it would reduce breeders' worries," Guo Wenguang said. Facing unstable market conditions and low prices, most banks also do not support the breeding industry much, and bank financing terms are relatively short. Funding has always been the main factor hindering companies' expansion. He hopes that policy-based insurance for breeding can be further improved.