Anchor: The avian influenza outbreak is taking a severe toll on the supply of eggs in the nation. Supply has dropped to 20 percent, heralding an egg crunch around the country.
Park Jong-hong has this report.

Report: Shelves were almost cleared out at the egg section of a discount retail outlet in Cheongju City on Tuesday.

The store manager said he couldn't secure enough supplies. He used to get 300 30-egg packs a day before the avian flu outbreak.

[Sound bite: agricultural produce manager at chain discount store]
"Compared to the usual supplies per order, we are only getting 20 to 30 percent worth. We are unable to place orders and we are getting rations from the headquarters.”
 
The situation was even worse at mom-and-pop stores. A store owner said egg shelves have already been empty for a week.
 
[Sound bite: local grocery store owner (Korean)]
"I got an urgent call from a nursery home asking for eggs so I went out to get some, but I couldn’t get any.”
 
Wholesalers said that the situation is unprecedented.

[Sound bite: egg wholesaler (Korean)]
“If this drags on, we will have to shut down our business and find a new job. I have been doing this for 30 years and I have never seen anything like this.”
 
He used to distribute 60-thousand eggs on average a week but business has been at a standstill for some three weeks.

The current AI outbreak led to the culling of more than 17 percent of layer chickens and nearly 39 percent of layer breeders.

Even if the animal disease is contained, it won't bring an immediate end to the egg crunch. It takes seven months for a chick to grow and lay eggs.

After Lotte Mart began to limit the sale of eggs to 30 per consumer, the largest retail chain E-mart also followed suit.

At some stores, egg prices have shot up by almost 16 percent over the last two weeks.
Park Jong-hong, KBS World Radio News.