China’s hog herd remains static despite price jump

China’s hog and pork prices have risen exponentially but that has not caused an increase in herd size, according to Chinese government statistics.

The Ministry of Agriculture is reporting that wholesale pork prices in October are nearly double what they were the same time last year, while hog prices are up nearly 140 percent, according to the Dim Sums blog.

However, data from China’s National Bureau of Statistics indicate that pork output was 12.1 million tonnes in the third quarter of 2022, which is nearly identical to third quarter of 2021 production of 12 million tonnes.

“The number of hogs slaughtered during Q3 this year was almost identical to last year, at 154.5 million, and the inventory of hogs was slightly higher than a year ago,” stated Dim Sums.

The quarterly inventory was 444 million hogs, up from 438 million in the third quarter of 2021.

So, the herd size essentially stayed the same despite a near doubling in pork prices.