Selected trade flows of piglets in the EU internal market
Denmark is expected to have exported around 10 million piglets by the end of 2013. This means that Danish piglet exports have quadrupled since 2005. However, the booming growth rates of previous years have slowed considerably. Monthly export volumes are now subject to strong fluctuations in the order of 100,000 animals from month to month.
At two thirds of all Danish farrowing exports, the largest share goes to Germany. The German share, which used to be almost 100%, has been systematically reduced in recent years. Danish piglet transports to the new Eastern European countries have increased significantly, with a focus on Poland, whose sow numbers have fallen by more than 35% since joining the EU in 2004.
The Netherlands exports around 6.5 million piglets. In contrast to Denmark, there are clear signs of stagnation in the Netherlands. In this case too, Germany is the top destination for reasons of transportation costs alone, with a share of just over 4 million head. Transports to Poland, which were stronger in previous years, have decreased again.
Piglet transports are closely linked to the development of sow holdings in relation to pig fattening capacity in the individual importing countries over the last 10 years.
In the past, Germany has typically favored the expansion of increasing fattening capacities. At the same time, the number of sows decreased rapidly. Initially, the sharp rise in fertility rates partially compensated for this, but this has recently returned to normal levels. In the past, what was lacking in piglet material for fattening could be procured quite cheaply from the two neighboring countries of Holland and Denmark.
In Eastern European countries, pig farming has been significantly reduced in recent years as feed costs have risen. The focus has been one-sidedly on sow farming, which is not very competitive. However, farmer imports have only partially offset the decline in pig fattening in these regions. Recently, the herds appear to have stabilized at a low level.
The latest supply balances in the piglet sector indicate excess demand. Measured in terms of the number of fattening places, piglets are and will remain scarce in Europe for the time being and expensive relative to the price of fattening pigs. It is no longer so easy to pass on rising fattening costs to piglet prices, as was usual in previous years. Piglet availability is currently the bottleneck in the pig sector. Fewer piglets can only be compensated for to a small extent by higher slaughter weights.
The calculation for Germany is as follows: Assuming around 55 million slaughter pigs, a 1 kg higher slaughter weight results in around 55 million kg more pork. Assuming a slaughter weight of 95 kg pigs and a 2% loss rate, around 590,000 piglets are required to compensate for this. From 2012 to 2013, around 120,000 fewer sows were counted in Germany; at 20 piglets per sow per year, there is a shortfall of 2.4 million potential fattening animals; part of this could be compensated for by further increasing the productivity of the remaining sows by 350,000 piglets. This leaves a net deficit of around 1.45 million animals. In previous years, the shortfall was offset by increasing imports. Today, this is only partially the case.
