70,700 tonnes of eggs were produced in Norway last year.
This corresponds to 13.3 kilos of eggs per Norwegian showed
preliminary figures from the Budget Committee for Agriculture.
‘’The average weight of eggs is 63 grams. Thus, an average of
211 eggs per Norwegian per year’’ said Anne Ingun Løvberget of the
department on real estate, land and primary industry statistics of
Statistics Norway (SSB).
The calculation from last year was based on 2016 figures and showed
207 eggs per capita. Thus, we can establish a continued increase in
Norwegians’ egg consumption.
Moreover, more and more of us want to eat organic eggs, i.e. eggs
from hens that receive organic feed and which are released into the open air every day.
‘’In 2018, almost 10% of all eggs sold through the grocery trade in Norway were organic. That is double from ten years back’’ said Løvberget.
A larger appetite for eggs has led us to have more laying hens and farms that have chickens.
‘’Almost 4.5 million hens produced our eggs last year, distributed on 2,200 farms.
The number has increased annually since 2011’’ said Løvberget.
On average, Norwegian laying hens add well over 300 eggs each over the course of a year.
The laying hens are well distributed throughout the country. Finnøy in
Rogaland have the country’s highest chicken density. The municipality has 3,197 inhabitants and 212,500 hens.
It gives a total of 66 hens per inhabitant. Røyrvik municipality in Trøndelag have 47 hens per capita and Roan municipality in the same county have 31 hens per capita.
Further down the list are Hjelmeland, Namdalseid and Klepp with 16, 15 and 14 hens per inhabitant respectively. Steinkjer, Klepp, and Finnøy are the three municipalities in the country that have the most hens.
© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today
