Inside Pigs
Meat trade stabilizing, pig trade still stiff
The German pig price seems to have created a somewhat firmer floor after another unchanged quotation. Yet the mood is anything but good, there are quite a few pigs left and right.
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The main stabilizing factor is the recent slightly increased prices slaughterhouses for sale managed to achieve this, as is also evident from the changes in pig parts from DCA Markets. After months of falling prices, this is a boost for the market and slaughterhouses do not see themselves forced to further reduce purchasing quotations. However, due to a large supply of pigs, price increases do not seem to be an option.
Corona and disruptions cause supply to increase
The supply of live animals is too large for the slaughter capacity. Relatively few pigs were slaughtered in both the Netherlands and Germany in recent weeks. While in the Netherlands there were disruptions that disrupted plans, in Germany it was mainly corona-related problems that led to limited capacity. The availability of labor remains a pressing problem.
Saturday slaughter can relieve some of the pressure on the market
The opinion about market developments among traders differs depending on the sales channels they operate. Parties that always supplied a lot to German slaughterhouses are currently finding it difficult to find room for all animals ready for slaughter. The export of pigs for slaughter to Germany has fallen drastically in a few years. Last autumn, Dutch slaughterhouses took on extra supply by processing around 330.000 animals per week. Recently, during the same slaughter weeks in the Netherlands, only between 290.000 and 300.000 pigs are slaughtered per week.
What offers some hope is that in the coming weeks several slaughterhouses will also slaughter on a number of Saturdays: Vion (6), Westfort (4) and Compaxo (2). This could give slaughter numbers a nice boost and possibly make the depressed supply in a number of places more bearable.
The number of pigs slaughtered in Germany increased slightly last week to almost 814.000 heads, which was around 10.000 more than a week earlier. The carcass weights remained unchanged. The German VEZG quotation remains unchanged at €1,20 per kilo of slaughtered weight.