April 22, 2008

 

China's pork prices to remain high into the summer

 

 

China's pork prices are expected to stay high into the summer, until farmers bring new pigs to market.

 

Due to the recent harsh winter, farmers nationwide lost more than 4 million piglets.

 

Since last summer, the Chinese government has allotted subsidies to encourage farmers to raise more pigs.

 

Last year's pig disease outbreak cut down the pig population by 10 percent, driving up pork prices to record highs.

 

Experts previously forecast that pig stocks would recover by the second half of 2008.

 

Yet as heavy snow affected southern China, the number of piglets once again diminished.

 

Qi Jingmei, a senior economist at the State Information Centre, a top government think tank, said the winter froze many piglets to death and distorted efforts to build up stocks.

 

China's pig stocks rose 1.6 percent in the first three months of 2008 from a year earlier to 415.21 million head, the National Bureau of Statistics said last Wednesday.

 

China National Grain and Oils Information Centre estimates that pig stocks in the first quarter were up by 4.7 percent, indicating that feed demand was likely to show signs of recovery soon.

 

However, an official from the statistics bureau said it was hard to tell whether the stock of pigs would increase substantially by the second quarter because earlier forecasts had not reckoned with the winter storms.

 

Pork output in the first quarter rose a mere 2.3 percent from a year earlier to 12.84 million tonnes, less than the 3.7 percent growth in general meat, including pork, mutton, beef and chicken, the statistics bureau said.

 

Xie Yang, who studies rural issues at the Development Research Centre under the State Council, China's cabinet, said that the country may have to wait until May to hand pork prices.

 

Some officials forecast that the price of pork will remain at high levels until the end of this year.