Since several decades Ghen Corporation of Gifu, Central Japan successfully distributes LOHMANN LSL breeders in Japan. Over the years the market share has grown to an impressive 85 % of all white layers. In Japan LSL is called Julia. Early September 2022 Ghen Corporation organized their 25th Distributor Meeting. The event was attended by more than 30 staff members of all layer hatcheries. On behalf of EW Group Mr. Sijne van der Beek presented a paper on genetics. Mr. Ron Eek updated the audience on developments in the global egg market.

How did we achieve such an impressive growth of LSL in Japan?

  In the early years we had only one white variety LSL. Due to different preference for egg size in various regions, LOHMANN genetics started to develop varieties with different egg weight patterns.

How practical and flexible our experts are was shown by the example of a participating veterinarian who had questions about the timing of his daily farm visits. Effectiveness is our business and of course our team had advice and suggestions for improvement ready in this case as well. The Japanese table egg market is characterized by urbanareas where people prefer medium sized eggs and more ruralareas where large sized eggs are preferred. Besides diversification of egg size genetics also realized impressive progress in productivity and egg quality traits, which made the LSL the most popular white egger in Japan.

Ghen Corporation of Gifu is the only company with layer-typegrandparent stock. This gives them a large advantage, as they are notrestricted by import bans due to the ongoing global Avian Influenza restrictions.

They supply parentstock to merely all layer hatcheries spread over Japan. Their GP facility is located in an isolated area in northern Japan, with state of the art facilities and strict biosecurity. Ghen Corp. also has a team of specialists who support their customers both in PS-, hatchery- and commercial layers issues.  

The Japanese consumers demand excellent quality in all respect.

The Japanese egg market is highly quality orientated and therefore breeding companies have to concentrate not only on productivity of the birds, but also both external- (shell) and internal- (albumen height, absence of blood and meat spots) quality are crucial traits. The table egg market is predominantly white, but brown and tinted eggs are gaining popularity with the consumer.  

Estimated market shares: