Pelissero gift for graders

Harry Pelissero, general manager of the Egg Farmers of Ontario marketing board, is proposing changes to the definition of “Ontario eggs” that qualify for advertising and promotion subsidies under the province’s Foodland Ontario program.

The proposal is to allow up to 10 per cent of the eggs marketed under that logo to be “sourced from outside of Ontario.”

The proposal is outlined in a Dec. 6 letter to those who grade eggs and offers an opportunity to provide feedback.

The egg board offices are closed between Christmas and New Year, so no officials could be reached immediately for comment on who might have asked for the change or whether the board of directors and egg farmers were consulted.

Ontario’s main commercial egg-grading companies, such as Best Choice Eggs before it was sold this year, Burnbrae Farms Ltd. and Gray Ridge Egg Farms, have been importers of U.S. eggs whenever the national egg marketing agency – Egg Farmers of Canada – has been unable to find enough Canadian-produced eggs to meet market demand.

There have been increasing volumes of imported eggs, brought in under supplementary import permits granted by the federal government, in recent years.  Eggs imported under the supplementary import permits escape the high tariff designed to protect Canadian egg producers from lower-priced competition.

Until now, the Foodland Ontario promotion campaign has required that eggs sold under its logo be laid on Ontario farms.

Now Pelissero's proposal is to change that to allow up to 10 per cent of fresh Ontario eggs to be “sourced outside of Ontario”.

The change could be a significant benefit to egg-grading stations which would be able to put imported eggs into standard retail-ready packages rather than having to keep imported eggs separate and packaged in different retail-ready cartons.

It might, however, undermine consumer confidence in the Foodland Ontario logo and support for supply management.