Cakes, pastries to get more expensive as egg prices rise

Prices of cakes and other pastries -such as mamon, ensaymada, sans rival, silvanas and egg pie- may soon rise as local bakers make cost adjustments due to the rising prices of eggs in the local market.

The Philippine Baking Industry Group (PhilBaking) told this to the Inquirer on Tuesday, citing the challenges they are facing given the high prices of one of their main ingredients.

“The baking industry is greatly affected by the recent increases in egg prices. But this has been going on for more than six months now,” PhilBaking president Jerry Lao said in a text message.

“In cakes, we use more eggs than cake flour. Cakes, cupcakes are greatly affected,” he added.

Lao explained that they need to add P1 for a 50-gram cupcake for every P2 increase in the price of egg, for instance, but noted that other bakers may have different computations for their recipes.

Asosasyon ng Panaderong Pilipino president Lucito Chavez, whose group is composed of community bakers, said in a separate interview with the Inquirer on the same day that they are “struggling” not just with the prices of eggs but also with sugar.

“We are still doing costing on the price changes in eggs, sugar, cooking oil, yeast,” Chavez said when asked about how much of a price hike is needed for these products.

He said they wanted to account the price changes in all the ingredients first before they implement a price hike, saying they prefer  to have a one-time adjustment instead of a series of small changes.

“You can’t raise prices multiple times. You can only raise it once or maybe twice a year,” said Chavez, reasoning that hiking it several times may cause a pushback from the public.

Both Lao and Chavez said the prices of eggs have increased from P155 to P160 per tray in 2021 to the current price of P215 per tray.

As of Jan 17, the price of a single, medium-sized egg in markets in Metro Manila ranges from  P8 to P9, according to the market price monitoring of the Department of Agriculture (DA).

This is higher than the  P6 a piece recorded by the DA in the same period last year.

Chavez said the notable increase in egg prices was due to higher input costs on feed and logistics incurred by livestock growers.

Aside from prices, he said they were also concerned with the reported issues concerning the supply of eggs, urging the government to ensure that there is sufficient supply for the baking industry.

“Our biggest fear is on the supply, as there were rumors six months ago that there will be a shortage because of problems in the production side,” Chavez said, stressing that a shortage will pose an even bigger problem for them than high prices.

Since last year, the Marcos administration has been struggling to keep prices down and ensure adequate supply of some key food commodities, including sugar and onions.