SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Expect to shell out more for a carton of large eggs as benchmark egg prices in California have gone up by 150 percent in a year.
Last August, eggs were $1.45 per dozen large eggs and a year later the price is $3.61 for the same carton, according to information from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
The San Francisco Chronicle reports (http://bit.ly/1MIBYSS) Monday that the avian flu outbreak this spring resulted in the killing of 48 million domestic chickens and turkeys, mostly in the Midwest.
Higher chicken feed prices and the rollout of Proposition 2, which requires that all eggs sold in California come from farms that allow chickens to move around freely, also caused prices to soar, the newspaper reported.
Additionally, California produced 18 percent fewer eggs between May 2014 and May 2015, according to USDA statistics.