U.S. consumers can expect to pay more for their Thanksgiving turkeys this year as supplies have dwindled following the widespread outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza. Since the outbreak began this spring, more than 7.5 million turkeys have been removed from production in an effort to mitigate the disease. The losses were the latest blow to the national turkey flock which, was already shrinking due to a series of production challenges and industry contraction in recent years.
The combination of tight supplies and strong holiday demand will send retail turkey prices to record highs this year, according to a new research brief from CoBank’s Knowledge Exchange. Seasonal cold storage inventories of whole birds are at their lowest level since 2006 and wholesale prices for frozen turkeys are currently running about 30% higher than last year.