July 24, 2006

 

US pork exports for May up 11.3 percent from previous year

 

 

US pork exports for May were up 11.3 percent from a year earlier and the second largest monthly exports of record, according to the US Weekly Hog Outlook.

 

US pork exports were up 15.3 percent the first five months of this year compared with the same period last year.

 

With the exception of Japan, exports to most other countries were up.

 

Net pork exports for January - May were at 10.23 percent of production, with exports at 15.09 percent of production and imports at 4.86 percent of production.

 

Sow slaughter in recent weeks has is up higher than a year earlier. Slaughter of sows from the domestic herd was up 11.1 percent for the week ending July 1 and was up 10 percent for the four weeks ending Jul 1 and was up 10 percent for the four weeks ending Jul 1.

 

One reason proposed for the higher slaughter was that producers could have decided that now would be the time to bring the hogs to market because of disease problems.

 

Profits are expected to be slim and may even run into losses if feed costs increase due to lesser stock. 

 

Preliminary data showing a 4.5 percent increase in slaughter and this week's estimate of a larger herd size is causing worries of lower pork prices.

 

Despite these worries, cash hog prices strengthened last week in the face of the large slaughter.

  

US pork exports for May 2006

 

Japan	-9.5 percent
Canada	6.3 percent
Mexico	30.1 percent
Russia	151.7 percent
South Korea	59.4 percent
China	25.4 percent
Taiwan	54.7 percent
Caribbean	74.8 percent

                                                          

                                                                                                                  Source: US Weekly Hog Outlook