Today I would like to add more data for a better comprehension of the swine industry in this region.

• Approximately 9 per cent of world’s population is in Latin America
• Last year Latin America’s growth was 3.2 per cent
• In 2012 Latin America pork production reached about 7 million tons of pig meat (close to 6.5 per cent of total global pork production)
• With 1.5 million sows Brazil is the fourth producer country in the world and the first one in Latin America (56 per cent of total pork produced in Latin America comes from Brazil)
• Mexico and Chile are second and third with 1.23 and 0.58 million tons respectively
• Most of the countries from the region have increased pork production
• Argentina and Colombia were up on production in 2012 by 9.96 per cent and 10.29 per cent respectively. They show similar trend for the first semester 2013
• One of the factors to highlight is the rising on per capita pork consumption - over the last 6 years, for instance, Venezuela has increased per capita pork consumption on 105 per cent, Ecuador 75 per cent and Colombia 43 per cent

Latin America as the rest of the world have been hit by highest cost of production over the last few years due mainly to the cost of grain and value of importation for most of the countries in the region.

If you look at the graph below, you can see an extraordinary difference between two countries Venezuela and Argentina. This is a four years and four months trend from 2009 to April 2013. Brazil and Argentina, both grain producers, are still doing pretty well with their cost of production but the other countries are paying more for raising pigs on grain costs and importing feed.

Benchmarking Latin America Pork Production

• P/S/Y - Over the last four years LA has improved its pigs per sow per year (P/S/Y) rate to about 6 per cent. Having 24.8 p/s/y in 2008 compared to 2012 data 26.3 p/s/y. Currently the lowest one is Venezuela with 20 p/s/y and the best ones are Chile and Brazil with around 28 p/s/y.
• Slaughter weight - The average hog market weight in LA trends to increase a little bit. At this time the region shows 246 lb. (110 kg) liveweight average for market hogs which is about 5.7 per cent higher than four years ago. This trend is more noticeable in Mexico than any other country of the region.
• Lb./Sow/Year - LA region has improved on this parameter as well. 6,270 pounds/S/Y is the average in 2012, showing an increase of about 17 per cent over the last four years.

Pre-weaning mortality is below 9 per cent mainly due to ability to hire more and cheaper labour, better management and vaccination schedule they are using now in pig production.

Mexico is getting better on prices from the last report ($72.60 USD/lb) compared last week price on 81.00 USD/lb.

On the other hand Brazil’s prices have dropped from $73.90 USD, back in March to 51 cents per pound last week price.

In Northern South America countries like Colombia and Venezuela the price are still strong and producing margins to the producer even with higher cost of productions.