April 3, 2014
The French and Chinese governments signed a trade agreement allowing France's pig meat including hams, sausages and other meats to enter the world's biggest market for pork, reports the Wall Street Journal.
Carrefour SA, the world's second-largest retailer after Wal-Mart Stores Inc., said they are ready to give French pork products special treatment in its stores across China. France-based Carrefour has more hypermarkets in China than it does in France.
Among the best-known French ham is the Jambon de Bayonne ham, known for its sweet yet salty taste. Under French law, only pigs raised in the basin of the Adour River near the Spanish border can bear the name of Bayonne. These pigs are fattened with a strict diet of corn before being slaughtered and salted for up to a year.
For decades, Italy and Spain dominated as suppliers of cured ham, including Italy's Prosciutto of Parma and Spain's Serrano Ham. Exports of these European hams totalled more than €516 million (US$710.5 million) in 2013 while French ham paled in comparison, according to trade and export authorities.
Prosciutto makers in Parma commissioned studies to reassure American food-safety inspectors it was safe to eat meat that is cured, yet technically uncooked. Italy's government then set its sights on China, negotiating a trade agreement that assuaged decades-old concerns about the safety of the uncooked ham and prodding Italian restaurants across China to include it on the menu.
Spanish ham producers expanded their exports to China to €4 million (US$5.50 million) in 2013, from €592,000 in 2008. For instance, Spanish ham producer Grupo Montesano, based in the Canary Islands, raises thousands of Black Iberian pigs that produce hams famed for their crimson meat marbled with fat. The firm's China sales rose 25% in 2013 to €1.2 million (US$1.65 million), accounting for 7% of the company's total sales. Its hams retail at €800 (US$1,100.50) apiece.
In 2013, China consumed more than 50 million tonnes of pig meat and the average Chinese consumer is expected to eat 34 kg of pig meat annually by 2022, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. This figure is a third more than the projected average for other OECD members.
