Even though, the price of the last week of June was 1,493 euro ($2,030 US) -it went up 0,8 cents of euro ($1.08 US)- is €4,3 cents ($0.58 US) lower than a year ago.

Dragging a lower price accumulated of two per cent from the first half of the year as a consequence of the trade banning that Russia has imposed to the UE. The restrictions being executed to pigs from the Union are contrary to the rules established by the World Trade Organization (WTO), and in this sense they have asked to the WTO to resolve the legality of this unilateral enforced regulation. Russia is demanding a new health certificate. With this could accept animals of 14 member states like Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands and Portugal, among others and leaving out countries like France, Italy and Germany.

The dependency of Denmark and Germany to their Russian exports makes Danish pigs saturating the European market with cheap pork. On the other hand Germany cannot make up their exports to third party countries. The situation of Spain in this sense is totally opposite; it has a better market diversification exporting to countries like Japan, Korea and China, in addition to other European countries.

Then again, in the last years the abattoirs capacity to slaughter animals has done nothing but expand. So, the increasing amount of market hogs in the first quarter of 2014 compared to the same period in 2013, it has been 2.5 per cent more hogs (over 350,000 more pigs than a year ago) plus a 3.5 per cent increase in meat production (40,000 tons more of meat). This has been a new historic record for January-April 2014 period.

Due to a lower cost of production this year, the average of slaughter weights are well above compared with previous years. The industry is getting good margins. It seems like 2014 will be a great year for pig producers, if not health issues arise.

On the pork consumption side, we had a little decline over the first quarter 2014. Fresh meat dropped 1.3 per cent, while processed meat plunged about 4.7 per cent. The good news is that fresh pig meat has higher price than a year ago, endorsing pretty much the same invoice this year. Unfortunately it is not the same case in of processed meat consumption, taking off a turnover of 3.2 per cent.