World meat industry news

Over the past year, Russia has become a net exporter (a country whose exports of certain goods exceed imports - ROSNG) of meat products in monetary terms. As Interfax reports, this was stated by the General Director of the Institute for Agricultural Market Studies (IKAR) Dmitry Rylko.

The figure was $1.8 billion. At the same time, it includes prepared meat products, but does not include live cattle. Imports turned out to be very close to this figure - 1.75 billion. The expert noted that such an excess occurred for the first time in the history of observations. The main role, according to Rylko, was played by the supply of pork, poultry and meat by-products. The news agency also recalled that back in 2021 our country received a similar status in kind. As reported by the head of Rosselkhoznadzor, Sergei Dankvert, citing customs data, the figures were 650 thousand and 570 thousand tons, respectively. However, we note that such a slight lag in exports and imports means the risk of our country losing its status as a net exporter of meat. Therefore, manufacturers of these products need to focus on import substitution, and the state should stimulate it financially in every possible way and also provide non-financial assistance to exports.

The head of ICAR also assessed the prospects for China’s recently permitted supply of pork to its market. According to him, for this, Russian exporters still have to complete many procedures. He called another problem that the country today is experiencing overproduction of this meat, which is why the need for its import is decreasing and domestic prices for these products have even fallen slightly. At the same time, Rylko called the high competitiveness of Russian pork in comparison with other countries a plus. “So our pig farmers have a chance,” he concluded.

Interfax also provided specific data from the Argus federal information system owned by Rosselkhoznadzor on the export of main types of meat products for December 22 last year. According to them, pork was supplied to 14 countries, and its exports grew by six percent to 154,400 tons. 301,700 tons of poultry meat were shipped to 34 countries. 70.6 thousand tons of finished meat products were imported to 27 countries. Lamb exports increased 11 times to 10.3 thousand tons (seven countries), beef exports increased 30.2 thousand (24 countries), and horse meat exports increased 2.2 times to two thousand tons.