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UK/EU Pig Statistics - January 2010

This article provides a summary of the latest statistics relating to pigs in the UK and Europe by ThePigSite editor, Jackie Linden.

5 February 2010

5 minute read

The data are updated approximately quarterly by the UK Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), and include slaughter figures for all EU countries as well as details of UK carcass weights, pig meat production and trade.

The latest data in the current quarterly report from DEFRA provides figures for the UK for the full year 2009 (data is provisional) and up to September 2009 for the EU.

UK/EU Slaughterings

UK slaughterings of clean pigs in 2009 was 9.293 million – up 101,500 (+11.1 per cent) from 2008.

UK slaughterings for sows and boars in 2009 was 210,600, well down from the 235,000 a year previously.

The latest month for which data is available for EU pig slaughterings is September 2009, when the total for all 27 Member States came to 20.36 million. This is 281,000 or 1.4 per cent more than in 2008..

Total pigs slaughtered in the EU (thousand head)
Country	2008 total	Jan 2009	Feb 2009	Mar 2009	Apr 2009	May 2009	Jun 2009	Jul 2009	Aug 2009	Sep 2009
Belgium	11,157	943	867	969	907	853	955	901	906	968
Bulgaria	993	36	37	45	53	47	48	43	41	43
Czech Republic	3,804	274	259	293	280	266	277	264	263	262
Denmark	20,790	1,855	1,548	1,702	1,491	1,452	1,547	1,633	1,521	1,661
Germany	54,848	4,816	4,335	4,935	4,589	4,479	4,555	4,534	4,526	4,803
Estonia	496	33	34	36	35	31	31	31	31	31
Ireland	2,578	214	188	209	203	184	197	208	192	204
Greece	1,913	183	144	125	129	125	133	131	138	131
Spain	41,306	3,570	3,488	3,385	3,019	3,136	3,146	3,068	2,892	3,245
France	25,735	2,169	1,968	2,142	2,064	1,888	2,116	2,087	2,032	2,154
Italy	13,616	1,099	1,019	1,075	1,038	1,016	1,034	1,038	945	1,053
Cyprus	725	59	58	49	57	62	62	64	59	66
Latvia	524	29	30	30	32	28	27	25	24	24
Lithuania	937	55	46	43	40	32	36	48	46	43
Luxembourg	150	11	9	12	12	11	12	12	10	11
Hungary	4,994	332	328	379	358	340	339	320	322	370
Malta	102	7	7	8	8	7	7	8	7	8
Netherlands	14,505	1,157	1,047	1,166	1,094	1,063	1,073	1,210	1,090	1,189
Austria	5,553	462	422	505	468	427	452	452	450	464
Poland	22,321	1,445	1,393	1,555	1,499	1,566	1,572	1,603	1,524	1,596
Portugal	5,976	459	433	469	486	443	476	512	519	507
Romania	5,660	163	182	215	270	237	221	230	235	237
Slovenia	381	25	23	27	24	24	24	23	21	22
Slovakia	1,084	62	62	68	57	61	61	63	65	68
Finland	2,459	192	193	210	188	184	204	204	178	197
Sweden	3,073	254	246	266	248	235	244	263	240	246
United Kingdom	9,427	835	690	717	854	690	723	909	761	756
EU-27	255,107	20,739	19,055	20,634	19,504	18,884	19,573	19,884	19,037	20,360

UK Carcass Weights

The average UK-killed and dressed carcass weight in 2009 was 78.0 kg, 1.4 kg heavier than the 2008 average.

The average dressed carcass weight for UK-killed sows and boars was 151.7 kg, only marginally higher than the 151.3 kg average for 2008.

UK Pig Meat Production

Total pig meat production in the UK in 2009 was 757,000 tonnes, of which 635,000 tonnes was pork and 122,000 tonnes was bacon and ham.

UK Home-Cured Bacon and Ham Production

For the fourth quarter of 2009, total home-cured ham and bacon production amounted to 52,000 tonnes. Of this, 29,000 tonnes (56 per cent) was produced from pigs slaughtered in the UK, and the rest from imported pig meat.

For 2009, total home-cured ham and bacon production was 189,000 tonnes, of which 104,000 tonnes (55 per cent) was produced from pigs slaughtered in the UK,

UK Trade in Pork, Bacon and Ham

The latest data available for UK trade in pig meat is for September 2009. For the year to that date, 271,000 tonnes of pork was imported into the country – 265,000 tonnes from other EU countries.

For pork exports, the total to that date was 71,200 tonnes – 53,900 tonnes to the EU and 17,300 to other countries.

All bacon and ham imports to the EU came from other EU countries and amounted to 224,000 tonnes. Of the total 14,500 tonnes exported to September, 14,200 tonnes were destined for other EU member states.