How many slaughterhouses does Germany have?

Just under 60 million pigs are slaughtered in Germany every year. The majority of pig slaughters are carried out by a handful of large slaughterhouses that dominate the market. However, in the background there are many more companies that slaughter pigs. 

In total, Germany has 4.177 companies that are officially recognized for the slaughter of pigs. These figures have been released by the Bundesamtes für Verbraucherschutz und Lebensmittelsicherheit (BVL). This after Alliance 90, popularly called a "green" political party, requested this in connection with an animal welfare survey.

Butchers also slaughter
The relatively high number of companies is due to the fact that many butchers in Germany slaughter their animals themselves. The 10 largest slaughterhouses have a market share of more than 75 percent. Of these, Tönnies, with approximately 16,2 million pigs slaughtered in 2016, is by far the largest.

In record year 2011, a total of 59,32 million pigs were slaughtered in Germany. Last year, the counter still recorded 59,26 million slaughtered pigs.  

Knowledge session pig market and politics
Leave on Monday June 12, 2017 in Arnhem free* catch up about the latest political and market developments in pig farming. 

The evening features several speakers, including:
- Jaco Geurts (Member of Parliament CDA),
- Jan Schuttert (chairman advisory committee DCA BestPigletPrice and DCA Beursprijs 2.0)
- Pieter Post (DCA market expert). 

This evening the leadership is in the hands of Henk Bleker. 
Sign up here for free

* The event is free for Pigs & Feed Pro subscribers. Non-subscribers pay 10 euros entrance.

Wouter Job

Wouter Baan is editor-in-chief of Boerenbusiness. He also focuses on dairy, pig and meat markets. He also follows (business) developments within agribusiness and interviews CEOs and policymakers.

w.baan@boerenbusiness. Nl

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