From Spain to the UK. What is the situation in the English pork market?

The price for pork is £2.13 per kilogram of carcass (97 cents per pound of live weight in the  US ). We understand that this is the highest price for pork in the history of the UK.

The number of slaughter pigs over the past few weeks has decreased by 20-25% compared to the same period last year. This was due to the same proportion of sows being slaughtered.

Processors are trying to get more pigs because of their scarcity. After talking to different people, there will be even fewer pigs available due to seasonality and elimination of sows. This is the same scenario we saw last week when we visited Spain at the Figan trade show. it is likely that pork prices in England and Europe will rise even more, beyond the already existing record prices.

About half of the pigs in the UK are raised in state farms. Many of them belong to processors. Producers receive a £20 ($25) bonus for these pigs, which are part of the Freedom Food program. Producers say they needed this premium to compensate for lower sow productivity in backyard farms and high feed conversion rates in finishers.

The UK, with fewer pigs, will import about 60% of its pork needs, all pork will be imported from Europe. Previously, there were about 800 thousand sows in the UK, now there are less than 250 thousand. Many animal welfare requirements have been introduced over the past twenty years, driving up production costs and leaving the UK industry vulnerable to cheap imports that are not subject to such regulations. It seems that most consumers pay little attention to labels such as animal welfare, provenance, housing conditions, etc. when it comes to buying pork.

In the UK, retailers have more power in defining pork products than in any other country we have visited. A lot of pork is factory retailer-branded and even priced before it leaves the factory to be sold on store shelves.

One manufacturer told us that the total sales of ready-made sandwiches are greater than the total of all agricultural products grown in the UK. This indicates that there are a lot of ready-made sandwiches in the UK, as well as a large amount of agricultural products that are imported into the country.

The unique part of the UK pig industry is that, despite significant imports, it is an exporter of pork and is ranked sixth in the world in terms of its volume. They EXPORT edges, internals, etc. - foods that they do not consume.

GENESUS now has more purebred products in the UK than any other genetics company. Sales are not limited to the UK, but also extend to the EU and Africa.

The UK was previously home to many of the world's top genetics companies such as NPD, Newsham, Cotswolds, but they no longer exist. JSR is currently working with Topigs. Based on the London Stock Exchange, PIC has almost no genetics core in the UK. Genesus is firmly committed to growing in the UK market.

Results

In the UK, as in Europe, record prices. Last week, the price was almost twice as high as in the US. We expect that pork supply in the UK and Europe will continue to decline in the near future. The combination of high feed prices and reduced supply has led many importing countries to look to the US and CANADA for their pork needs. Last week, export sales of pork from the United States amounted to more than 53 thousand tons, which is the highest figure this year. We expect further growth in export sales from the US to Canada, which will lead to higher domestic prices for pork.