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The Christmas goose is expensive this year - especially if it comes from German breeding.
"On average, the consumer price is 20 to 30 percent higher than last year," said Wolfgang Schleicher, Managing Director of the Central Association of the German Poultry Industry, the SPIEGEL.
The animals cost around 20 euros per kilogram.
On the one hand - as with other foods - the increased costs for energy and feed are reflected.
On the other hand, the poultry industry is still suffering from avian influenza.
"We are more affected by this with geese than with other species," says Schleicher.
While chickens and turkeys have offspring all year round, breeding geese lay up to 60 eggs once a year.
"Anyone who had a plague in the spring and had to cull their goose parents needs about a year and a half to raise animals that are ready for slaughter again." That severely decimated the supply.
Domestic geese make up only about 15 percent of the German market, the rest is imported from Poland, Hungary and France.
Prices have gone up here too.
However, this goose meat is generally cheaper.
This is not only due to the fundamentally lower production costs, the meat is often cross-subsidized by other controversial products: Foie gras, for example,
is
considered a delicacy, but the painful stuffing of the liver violates European animal welfare standards.
These standards are ignored in some EU member states.
The most important foie gras producers are Hungary and France, with France having secured
foie gras
as gastronomic cultural heritage and claiming an exemption from animal welfare for this.
Potato salad with sausage and mayo
According to the Federal Statistical Office, almost 2,600 tons of goose meat were produced last year.
Almost three quarters of annual production falls in the months of October, November and December.
There is hardly any demand for goose meat during the year, but it is popular as Christmas or Martin goose.
Martin's Day is November 11th.
Young fattening chickens (68.1 percent) and turkeys (27.8 percent) have the largest share of German poultry.
But it's not just roast goose that's getting more expensive.
The German Economic Institute (IW) has calculated that a "traditional potato salad with sausages" at this year's Christmas dinner costs 23.4 percent more than at last year's festival.
It is even slightly higher than the current rate of price increases for food, which the IW puts at 21 percent.
The researchers give the tip: If you serve the salad with vinegar and oil instead of mayonnaise, you can save a lot.
In addition, the ingredients are much cheaper to get in the east of the republic.
Lower incomes and shop rents made themselves felt there.
