As a consequence, the quotations continued to go up in the majority of the European countries. In France, the producers were able to push through a price which exceeds by 6 cents the last week’s price as a result of the scarce supply.

The prices in Germany, the Netherlands and Austria developed in a synchronous way, just as they had over the past weeks. There, the prices went up by 5 cents. In Spain, a 3 cents’ price increase could be realised. Germany now has seized the top position within the European price structure, closely followed by Belgium and the Netherlands.

The price level currently prevailing is a quite unusual one to be documented in the month of January. Such prices were lastly quoted in 2001, when the market was strongly characterised by the BSE crisis. The supply getting scarcer in Europe must well be attributed to the bad economic situation the piglet producers had to cope with over the past two years.

The decisive impetus given to the market is based on booming exports to non-EU countries and to Russia and the Asian countries in particular. From the producers’ point of view the price level prevailing currently is a very welcome one. Yet, the producers find it long overdue for covering the considerably increased costs in pig production.

Trend for the German market: The atmosphere proves to be friendly on the German market. Even at the new prices, the pigs mature for slaughter are well in demand. In view of the scarce market supply, the increased prices should as well be enforceable in trade and industry. On top of that, this week’s icy temperatures will most probably be resulting in a decreasing quantity of supply. Therefore, the prices are expected to remain steady at least.

Explanation
¹corrected quotation: The official Quotations of the different countries are corrected, so that each quotation has the same base (conditions).
base: 56 per cent lean meat; farm-gate-price; 79 per cent killing out percentage, without value-added-tax (VAT)