Agriculture Sec. Brooke Rollins unveiled a plan to lower egg prices in both the short and long term on Wednesday.
Rollins made the announcement during an appearance on Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom,” saying President Donald Trump’s administration is taking a multi-prong approach to combat the bird flu that has ravaged chicken populations and therefore sent the price of eggs skyrocketing.
Rollins blamed the current high prices on a “long road” of overregulation going back to President Barack Obama’s administration.
The Trump official also highlighted efforts to re-populate poultry farmers who were forced to slaughter most or all of their populations due to exposure to the virus, a policy Rollins says the administration is investigating.
When asked by host Dana Periono if it was time to revisit the policy of killing chickens, Rollins confirmed that the Trump administration is researching whether changing the policy would be effective.
“We are going to have some pilot programs across the country that work to prove that out,” Rollins said. “The avian flu is an extremely fast-spreading virus, and within a couple of days it spreads so quickly that most of the chickens have died anyway. But there are some farms that are out there and that are willing to really try this.”
Rollins says that in the short term, her agency is working to import eggs from other countries in order to meet demand and lower prices in the U.S. She stressed that such purchases are not a long-term solution, however.
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