Hog price has been on the downslope for four months running, reducing hog farms’ profit to RMB50/head currently. Consequently, hog farms are poorly motivated to add piglets to pigsties, resulting in a dull piglet market.
Piglet price is RMB20/kg currently, down 30% from the beginning of this year and down 44% from the peak level in April. Low piglet price has incurred losses in brood sow farms. Some farms are slaughtering sows to cut down brood sow inventory. China’s brood sow inventory is about 32 million heads currently, accounting for 8% of the total pig inventory. If brood sow farms keep cutting down sow inventory, it would affect hog production in the coming months.
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