World meat industry news

A new word for those who are not professionally related to agriculture, but are interested in the state of affairs in it: compartment. This is not a compound word and has nothing to do with the company or the party. But it can ensure successful promotion for a large or small agricultural enterprise. As well as lead him to bankruptcy.

Bankruptcy quite recently could happen to our neighbors, in the Pskov region: one of the largest pig-breeding enterprises in this region turned out to be at a critical point. Together with two leading pig-breeding complexes already in our, Leningrad, region, it is part of the Idavang-Agro company. And they have the same leadership.

What kind of "beast" is this compartment? This is a zoosanitary status that determines the level of biological protection of livestock farms, complexes and farms, as well as enterprises that process and store livestock products.

A compartment has four statuses. Which one to assign to the enterprise is decided by the inspection of the Rosselkhoznadzor based on the results of the inspection of the facility. Inspectors of the supervisory authority determine the risks associated with the spread of pathogens of contagious animal diseases, including ailments common to both animals and humans. In general, the enterprise is “woolled” in full, including all its employees. The fact is that a person can be a carrier of an infection, and pigs can be active or passive carriers of it.

The lowest animal health status is "compartment I". Prior to passing the survey or in case of refusal, all farms have it. It means the complete insecurity of production from the threats of diseases, epidemics and other similar misfortunes. Low level of protection establishments receive “compartment II”. The middle level is "compartment III". Accordingly, the highest level of protection is “compartment IV”.

Which was the Pskov pig-breeding complex. Last year it was only necessary to confirm it. But a strict inspector from the Rosselkhoznadzor revealed inconsistencies: he called the washing of cars at the entrance and exit from the territory a profanation; found the risks of dust-borne African swine fever (ASF) virus; reminded the management that just two years ago, an outbreak of this disease was recorded at the enterprise ...

In a word, they refused to assign a high status to the pig farm. And here is the subtlety: a farm with a low or medium level of protection does not have the right to send its products for processing to high-status enterprises. In our country, almost all meat processing plants have gone to great lengths to get the coveted “compartment IV”. Thus, the Pskov pig breeders were losing sales partners, remaining in front of the question: “Where to put the fattened piglets?”. And the livestock in the complex, by the way, is 60 thousand pigs.

And they announced a rush at the enterprise - they cleaned, washed, scrubbed ... They caulked "holes", eliminating the risks of introducing any infection. Improved sanitation - and animal habitats, and transport, and each employee, including management personnel.

And it’s not in vain that they rushed! Towards the end of last year, the North-Western Interregional Directorate of Rosselkhoznadzor recognized the presence of a high level of biological protection in production. With the assignment, as expected, of the appropriate status - “compartment IV”.

Prolific industry

Today, Russia has provided itself with pork, as they say, to the eyeballs. It is even hard to imagine that just some two decades ago, domestic industrial pig breeding was on the verge of complete extinction. I didn’t even dream of any compartments and other statuses if huge complexes were closed and the last sows were taken away for slaughter…

Let's not speak "for the whole of Russia", let's remember our native Leningrad region. Until 1990, its agricultural organizations had an average of 610 thousand pigs. Another 200,000 were kept in personal subsidiary plots (PSPs). Even during the years of general food shortages, Leningrad was always provided with pork. By the beginning of the 2000s, the industrial pig population had decreased tenfold!

Pig farming has been called a "quick win industry". Not so, of course, it is “fast” as in poultry farming, and yet ... With proper feeding, maintenance and care, a sow can give birth to 10 to 14 piglets, and besides, twice a year. The daily weight gain of each piglet is six hundred grams, as experts say, "already good and almost excellent." But in industrial pig breeding, weight gain exceeds one kilogram. With a balanced and nutritious feeding, they reach one and a half kilos per day. After five or six months, the piglet is ready to become ... pork.

The whole essence of “quick returns” in the middle of the 2000s was seen through by investors - both Russian and foreign. They began to invest a lot of money in the revival of a heavily battered industry. Just then, the memorable national project "Development of the Agro-Industrial Complex of Russia" arrived in time. The industry was fueled by government funding.

At the same time, the already mentioned Danish company Idavang came to our region. There is a joke about Denmark: “There are more pigs in this small state than people.” Indeed, the Danes know a lot about modern pig breeding technologies. And since their land resources are limited, Danish entrepreneurs are expanding production in other regions of the world.

In the Leningrad region, they brought back to life the Vostochny pig-breeding complex that flourished in Soviet times and later collapsed in the Tosnensky district. The name, however, was changed. We started construction and put into operation another pig-breeding complex near Luga. At the same time, they launched their activities in the Pskov region. The current participation of the Danish side in the Russian subsidiaries can be considered indirect. Almost all key positions belong to the Russian management.

Today, five specialized closed-cycle enterprises and three feedlots operate in the industrial pig breeding of the Leningrad Region. In several more diversified farms, pig breeding is listed as a sub-sector. The total number of pigs in agricultural organizations averages 170 thousand. How many "piglets" are left in private farmsteads, official statistics are silent. Unofficial voices different data: from 1.5 thousand to 500 heads. Perhaps even less.

The fact is that the breeding of pigs in household plots and farms is subject to a ban, although not strict. This is a consequence of the threat of the African swine fever virus. Its foci continue to flare up in all swine-producing countries in Europe. Neither Russia nor the Leningrad region were an exception. Moreover, the source of infection is not pig farms isolated from all sides, but farmsteads and small pig farms.

“We live like on a swing,” Russian pig breeders sometimes complain. - Just managed to take off - the plague! We are falling… We just started to take off – WTO! We are falling…”

World Trade Diktat

The history of the World Trade Organization (WTO) is, of course, a long one. But not forgotten. It hit the industry hard. The WTO began to dictate its terms to Russia almost from the very moment it joined. And this happened, we recall, ten years ago, in 2012.

The result of the dictatorship was an increased dependence on pork imports. Even before that, it was considerable, and in just three or four months after Russia's accession to the WTO, it grew by more than a third. Unrestrained import "rolling" reduced the price of pork by 25 - 30%. Then the National Union of Pig Breeders of Russia calculated: the industry, which has a profitability of 20-25%, after joining the WTO, dropped to - (minus!) 15-20%.

It is clear that not everyone was destined to survive in such conditions. In the first year of world-trade “happiness”, 104 farms ceased to be engaged in industrial pig breeding - a fourth of those that at that time were considered large enterprises. In the Leningrad region, for example, the Novy Svet and Rusbelgo pig-breeding enterprises in the Gatchina region went bankrupt - the first-born of the revival of the industry in the region.

About fifty more farms were preparing for the exit. However, the food sanctions imposed by Russia in 2014 led to the need for import substitution. The industry began to receive solid state support. In 2018 alone, 250 billion rubles of concessional loans were allocated for the construction of new complexes.

2019 is considered a turning point for the Russian pig industry. For the first time in thirty years, 

pork calves were able to cover the domestic demand for this meat. Self-sufficiency reached 104.7%. The country no longer needed pig imports. Surplus production went for export. Numerous investment projects under the program of concessional lending to the industry, which started earlier, have entered the completion stage.

Having displaced Brazil, our country was able to get into the top 5 world meat producers. In the first place in this ranking is China. The second, third and fourth places were distributed, respectively, between the USA, Germany and Poland.

The rating of the largest pork producers within the country was headed by Miratorg. For more than ten years the company has been a leader in pork production. The Russian top-5 also includes the Velikoluksky pig-breeding complex, the RusAgro and Cherkizovo groups of companies and the Agrokomplektatsiya holding.

According to the results of the past year, 2022, pork production in agricultural organizations increased by another 8%. And all pig farms taken together produced 4.5 million tons of meat (in slaughter weight). The dynamics of production, for comparison, looks like this: 2018 - 3.7 million tons; 2019 - 3.9 million tons; 2020 and 2021 - 4.3 million tons each.

Now, Russian pig breeding can be compared not with a swing, but with a speeding up high-speed train. Yury Kovalev, General Director of the National Union of Pig Breeders, spoke about the prospects for its movement in the foreseeable future: “This year, pork production may increase to 5.7 million tons; in 2024 - up to 6 million tons; in 2025, the increase will be small - 35-40 thousand tons. At the same time, the growth in production volumes due to the commissioning of new pig farms built on loans issued in 2018 will stop.”

An interesting fact: in recent years, pork prices have been approaching the prices of poultry meat. If earlier on the wholesale market pork was 50% more expensive than poultry, now it is 20-25%. And boneless pork and chicken fillet were completely equal in price. Perhaps the time will come when the layman will finally allow himself to at least sometimes change in his diet the chicken meat that has been pretty fed up in recent years for a good piece of pork.

Comparing the industry to a speeding train is, of course, pretty. Only now this "train" has a serious risk - overproduction.

Theoretically, there should be ways for surpluses to foreign markets. In 2022, Russia exported 560,000 tons of meat. But mostly it's poultry and beef. Pork exports sank by 5%. For obvious reasons, supplies to Ukraine decreased (-75%). Deliveries to Vietnam (-51%) and Hong Kong (-59%) decreased - after the ASF epidemics, the development of their own pig breeding in these countries went by leaps and bounds. The decline in exports was partially offset by an increase in shipments to Belarus (+143%) and Kazakhstan (+71%).

With hope, Russian pig farmers are looking at the Chinese market. There, due to the same African plague, the number of pigs has almost halved, and the potential of Russian exports is estimated at 300,000 tons. Some part of our pork is already going to China, negotiations on large-scale supplies are ongoing. By the way, even the President of Russia did not pass by this topic. “We will work calmly, rhythmically, I am sure that we will come to an agreement,” Vladimir Putin said at an event on Russian selection and genetics.

In the meantime, according to the results of the year ended, the total pork surplus has already approached 250 thousand tons, which will remain on the domestic market. Of course, there are worthy uses for them. Pork is the best raw material for the eternal emergency stock. For stew. By the way, perhaps the quality of this product, which has noticeably deteriorated in recent decades, will return to the high standards of Soviet times.