China’s demand for pork continues to fall

According to the latest government data, China imported a total of 2.64 million tons of pork and pork by-products in 2023. Compared to 2022, that was a decrease of 5.2%. Import volumes of 4 to 5 million tons from 2020 and 2021 are now a long way off due to the reconstruction of Chinese pig stocks after the ASF crisis there. Of the quantities imported in 2023, 1.54 million t came from the fresh and frozen pork categories and 1.1 million t from the slaughter by-products category. Imports of meat and by-products therefore developed very differently. This meant a decrease of 11.6% for fresh and frozen pork compared to the previous year, while there was an increase of 5.6% for slaughter by-products. The largest delivery volumes for China continued to come from the EU in 2023. Overall, around half of imports of pork and by-products came from EU countries. The most important supplying countries were Spain with almost 602,000 t, the Netherlands with around 241,000 t and Denmark with ...