By Rose de la Cruz
With low inventory during the first quarter this year because of the African Swine Fever that forced many hog farmers to cull their pigs, it is expected that pork prices in the coming days would rise substantially.
Already the National Meat Inspection Service reported a sharp drop in the inventory of pork by nearly a quarter with storage facilities nationwide showing a 24.79 percent decline to 50,658 metric tons as of May 13 from last year’s 67,359 MT.
The NMIS, an attached agency of the Department of Agriculture, said the chunk of inventory during the period was from imports at 49,899 MT, or lower than the 64,214 MT from last year’s imports in the same period.
It cited the African Swine Fever as the main reason for the plummeting local production of 758 MT from last year’s 3,145 MT recorded last year that stunted pork output.
Month on month, the latest frozen pork inventory was 2.45 percent lower than the 51,929 MT recorded last April 15, Business Mirror quoted the NMIS data as it said that dressed chicken inventory slid by 10.36 percent year on year to 43,632 MT.
The bulk of the inventory consisted of imports at 27,460 MT, lower than last year’s 31,641 MT, the paper said.
Cold storage facilities in Region 3 and Region 4-A held a chunk of the pork inventory during the period. Both regions also accounted for the bulk of the dressed chicken inventory, according to NMIS.
The agency said its latest frozen pork inventory came from accredited commercial and in-house cold storage, such as slaughterhouses and meat processing plants.
The NMIS said that dressed chicken inventory data did not include freshly chilled chicken and mechanically deboned meat, adding that the inventory for those already in distribution channels was not included.
The Philippine Statistics Authority confirmed that the seasonally adjusted value of livestock production recorded a 1.8 percent drop.
“Hog was the top contributor to the contraction in the value of production during the first three months of 2024,” the PSA said.
The country’s local hog industry continues to grapple with the ASF which spurred culling that led to the decline in hog output to 1.793 million MT in 2023, lower than the nearly 2.3 MMT recorded before the ASF hit the country.
ASF is a contagious swine disease with a 100% fatality rate that affects domestic pigs and wild boar. It has been reported in several countries.