VietNamNet Bridge – CP Vietnam Livestock Corporation, found as the culprit who pushed up the chicken egg prices up in recent days, has become the subject for extreme public criticism.

The sharp egg price increase, which put urban dwellers on tenterhooks, has just been eased after the HCM City Department of Industry and Trade had a working session with CP Vietnam to clarify the pricing policy of the company.

At the meeting, CP Vietnam admitted that it raised the prices continuously in recent days for profits, while promising to set up more reasonable prices in the time to come.

A senior executive of CP Vietnam said that CP Vietnam always adjusts the prices in accordance with the market demand. Believing that the demand always goes high on the days before Tet, the company has raised the chicken egg prices in order to optimize its profits.

However, the industry and trade department stated that the price increase was unreasonable. The egg imports since December 2012 are big enough to satisfy the domestic demand. Moreover, the feed prices remain unchanged; therefore, CP Vietnam has no reason to raise egg prices.

According to the department, the egg prices had been increasing so rapidly since the beginning of the year. Chicken egg prices once jumped to VND2700 dong per egg instead of VND2400, while duck eggs at VND3500 instead of VND3000.

Meanwhile, the farmers, who raise fowl for CP Vietnam under the outsourcing contracts, affirmed that they still provided eggs to CP Vietnam at VND1,550 dong, the price which has been stable over the last year.

As such, the egg production cost would be some VND1,700 dong if counting on the transport and packaging fee. Meanwhile, on January 13, CP Vietnam still sold at VND2,500.

The unreasonable egg price increases have upset the normal daily lives of people. In HCM City, housewives hurry to supermarkets to buy eggs to store in their refrigerators. As the demand increased too sharply, some supermarkets only accepted to sell 20 eggs a day to each client.

It seems that not only consumers suffered from the egg price increases, but CP Vietnam has also tasted the bitterness when it deliberately raises big difficulties for consumers.

CP Vietnam has eased the chicken wholesale egg prices from VND2,600 dong to VND2.300. Besides, it said it has offered the preferential price of VND2,160 dong to Saigon Co-op, which is equal to the price applied by the enterprises which join the city’s program on stabilizing consumer goods on Tet holiday.

However, Bui Hanh Thu, Deputy General Director of Saigon Co-op has stated that the supermarket chain has not accepted the offer by CP Vietnam yet.

“It’s not a good behavior of pushing prices up and then forcing prices down, because it causes uncertainty to the market. CP Vietnam has eased its prices, but this does not mean that Saigon Co-op has to accept its every move,” Thu said on VnExpress.

“CP Vietnam should have taken actions to share the difficulties with consumers instead of pushing prices up to seek profits,” she added.

Meanwhile, Thoi bao Kinh te Saigon has quoted Nguyen Ngoc Son, PhD, a lecturer of the HCM City National University, as saying that if CP is found as violating the competition law, it would be imposed the fine worth 5-10 percent of total revenue.

CP Vietnam, a 100 percent Thai invested enterprise, has been well known as a company which controls the livestock feed and livestock markets.

In 2011, CP Vietnam reportedly obtained the turnover of $1.5 billion.

Compiled by Thu Uyen