Market under the grip of pig and piglet shortages

The shortage of piglets and slaughter pigs continues into early March. The DCA BestPigletPrice breaks the threshold of €50 per piglet this week, while the DCA Beurs Mutation Price also rises again, despite the pig market making a somewhat half-hearted impression. After two price increases in Germany of five cents each, the large slaughterhouses there are now aiming for an unchanged quotation. The chance that the German pig price (VEZG) will rise for the third consecutive week seems limited in advance. Due to stagnant meat prices, there is a lot of resistance, and there is no pronounced tight supply in Germany. Dutch slaughterhouses are heavily oriented towards the German market, despite the fact that the supply in their own country is indeed becoming tight. With 235,184 slaughters last week, there were exceptionally few pigs hanging for a full slaughter week. Due to many exits from production, lower numbers seem to be increasingly becoming the new reality. Strikes at slaughterhouses There is no direct fight for the pigs this week, partly because strikes are taking place at slaughterhouses on Tuesday. This masks the tight supply. At the same time, there is no need to push pigs to next week; the numbers are too limited, and the impact of the strike is too minor. For the next price increase, the strike comes at an unfortunate time, traders believe. Nevertheless, the DCA Market Mutation Price rises by 4 cents this week. The thought behind this is that Dutch slaughterhouses still need to catch up to align the payment level with Germany. Furthermore, based on the DCA pork meat mutations the raw material value of the pig increases this week by €0.023 per kilo, which provides room for a higher quotation. Piglet supply remains tight Meanwhile, the piglet supply in the Netherlands remains extremely tight, partly because Spain is buying large groups at rising prices. The free market has now crossed the threshold of €70 per piglet. Traders are balancing between strong export demand and domestic needs. Based on this, the DCA BestPigletPrice rises this week by €3.50 to €51 per piglet, the highest level since early July last year. It is expected that the Spanish demand will last for a few more weeks.