Uncertain commodities: egg banking and value in Ukraine

Abstract The development of vitrification techniques has increased the use donor ova by allowing for their cryopreservation, storage, and international transportation. However, implications egg banking valuation eggs remain little studied. Building on ethnographic fieldwork in a Ukrainian bank, this article I examine different mechanisms calculations that allow bank to transform vitrified ova—products with volatile outcomes—into valuable but uncertain commodities. This reveals how staff can never completely secure profits because variability quality assessment unpredictability expenses. demonstrate dilemmas arise when industry tries turn oocytes into commodities trigger certain efforts develop control selection, as well classification accounting schemes related oocyte quality.