Market leaders to increase pork production by 600 thousand tons by 2026

Three main factors will influence the industry's work in the new year: the epizootic situation, demand from the population and processors, and exports  - especially the factor of the opening of the Chinese market for pork supplies from RUSSIA. The grain market situation is also a very important factor for pig farmers. "In 2022, we started working with one grain price, and starting from the second half of last year, when it became clear what kind of harvest would be collected, grain prices dropped by 30-40%, creating a favorable base for livestock farming," Kovalev recalled. This allowed pork producers to reduce production costs from 90-95 rubles / kg in the first half of last year to 75 rubles / kg in the second and 85 rubles / kg on average last year. According to him, the average cost price for 2023 will be lower and will amount to 75-80 rubles / kg.

Kovalev estimates this year as quite good for pig farming. The EBITDA profitability of pig farms is at the level of the last five years, primarily due to the grain market situation. Also, over the last seven years, pork consumption has grown significantly: if in 2015 the indicator was at the level of 23.5 kg/person, then in 2023, according to the NSS forecast, it will be a record 30 kg/person. One of the reasons for this is the availability of this type of MEAT. In general, the average price of pork in Russia for 11 months of this year increased by only 6% compared to last year and has only just caught up with the price in 2021.

Our country has some of the lowest pork prices in the world in foreign currency terms, and this has allowed us to EXPORT more than 200 thousand tons of pork products in terms of slaughter weight in the first nine months of this year. "We exported live pigs, offal, and lard," Kovalev said. "Overall, for the year, we expect that the export of pork products in terms of slaughter weight will amount to 250 thousand tons, which is over 5% of our production and a significantly higher figure than in 2022." Russia is already among the top 10 global suppliers of pork products, and plans to enter the top 5 in the coming years. "This is a completely achievable goal - to do this, we need to ship 350-400 thousand tons of products to foreign markets," Kovalev concluded.