Demand for pork falls back after New Year's Eve, hog prices drop sharply this week

According to the monitoring of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the average price of pork in the national wholesale market for agricultural products was 20.93 yuan/kg on Feb. 23, down 6.4 percent compared with 22.37 yuan/kg on the previous Sunday (Feb. 18), and down 8.9 percent compared with 22.96 yuan/kg on Feb. 9, according to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. The average price for the week was RMB 21.3/kg, down 6.6% compared with the average price of RMB 22.8/kg in the week before the holiday.

Domestic hog prices were mainly down this week. According to the data of China Pig Farming Network, the price of hogs (outer three yuan) was RMB 13.69/kg on Feb. 23, down 15.2% compared with RMB 16.15/kg on last Friday (Feb. 16). In terms of the weekly average price, the average price of hogs this week was 14.4 yuan/kg, down 10.3% compared with last week's average price of 16.06 yuan/kg, and down 7.7% compared with the average price of 15.6 yuan/kg in the week before the holiday.

(Recent pork and live pigs prices, from Thepaper.cn)

According to Zhuochuang information monitoring, the eve of the Spring Festival with the slaughtering enterprises stocking up successively completed, the market bearish mood turned thick, driven by the high price of hogs down. During the Spring Festival, supply and demand are weak, and the fluctuation space of pig prices is relatively limited. After the festival, the end demand declined significantly, the product output is slow, the slaughtering enterprises to maintain a low level of work rate, while the breeding units of the pace of slaughtering has returned to normal. The weekly average price of hogs fell this week mainly from the abundant supply, but the post-holiday demand recovery was slow, supply exceeded demand, and prices declined. The national hog trading average weight continued to rise this week. Zhuochuang Information monitored the national average trading weight of hogs 122.06 kilograms, up 0.11% from the week before the festival. After the Spring Festival, the end demand decreases by a large margin, the market digestion is not smooth; coupled with the concentrated release of pig sources pressed before the Spring Festival and during the festival, the amount of large pigs out of the pig market has increased slightly. At the same time, with the weather warming up soon, the slaughterhouse on the large pig digestion weakened, large pigs face the phenomenon of price but no market, the breeding side of the positive out of the barn, driven by a number of places in the hog trading average weight rise. Demand, this week, the domestic hog key slaughtering enterprises start the first up and then down, the average weekly start rate of 22.85%, down 14.2 percentage points compared with the pre-holiday week. After the Spring Festival holiday, the terminal demand was significantly reduced compared with the pre-holiday period, superimposed on the impact of snowfall in the northern region, the slaughtering enterprise sales slowed down, the order recovery was slow, and productivity starts up first and then falls.

Hehe company believes that after the holiday, consumer demand in the live pig market has fallen back, and it is difficult to move goods downstream, Residents mainly consume stockpiled goods, the average daily operation of slaughtering enterprises is low, but the aquaculture end is still at a high level, and the frozen goods inventory rate of slaughtering enterprises is high, digestion is general, and trade performance is poor. The market pig supply is sufficient, consumer demand has weakened, and the pig market has returned to the situation of oversupply. From the analysis of the early breeding sow stock, the number of live pigs began to decrease in the second quarter, and the pig price may rise.

Xinhu company believes that the spot price of live pigs fell sharply this week, and the trend of the disk was differentiated. After the year, the inertia of pork demand fell back, affected by the cold wave weather in the early part of this week, hindering the transport of pigs, and the price decline was slower, but due to the poor demand side and the difficulty of walking goods, the price decline increased in the later part of this week. After the year, the enthusiasm of the breeding end of the low price column is still high, the supply of pig sources in the market is sufficient, and the Lantern Festival has a limited boost to the price.

ZhuoChuang Information forecasts that the market may experience a slight decline in the coming week, followed by stabilization. Demand support will remain limited, with farms being more active in selling pigs. As a result, pig prices are likely to drop slightly compared to the previous week. On the supply side, some farming enterprises have not met their production goals, and heavy snowfall has disrupted the movement of pigs, leading to some farms holding onto animals longer than planned. Once road conditions improve, the supply of pigs may increase, putting further pressure on the market. However, after a sustained decline in prices, some regions with lower prices may begin to show resistance to further price drops, which will help limit the extent of the decline. By the end of the week, the price decrease may narrow, and some areas may see stabilization. On the demand side, slaughterhouses are experiencing slow order turnover, with some businesses briefly increasing slaughter volumes before reducing them again. Once snowfall clears and road transport resumes, there could be a slight improvement in order volumes, but the overall impact on pig prices is expected to remain weak.