Germany slaughters 7% less pigs in 2023

Of those, 42.3 million animals were raised at pig farms in Germany itself, a decrease of 7.7% y-o-y, while the number of imported slaughter pigs increased by 19.5% to 1.5 million units. The vast majority of those, 960,000 animals, came from the Netherlands while the import of slaughter pigs from Belgium more than doubled to 370,000.

The production of pork in Germany last year amounted to 4.2 million tonnes, 6.8% or 306.500 tonnes less than in the previous year and the lowest figure in over 20 years. Compared to the record year 2016, the quantity of pork produced is now 1.4 million tonnes less, a decline of just over a quarter. The sharp decline has much to do with the steady reduction of the number of pigs in the country, although recently there are some signs of a slight recovery, reports from the statistical office show.

At the beginning of November 2023, the most recent figures available, the total number of pigs in Germany was 21.2 million. That was 150.600 animals or 0.7% less than a year earlier and even 2.5 million pigs or 10,7% less than in November 2021. However, the number for November last year was 1.3% or 266.000 higher than in May 2023 when the statistics office published its first agricultural report for 2023. That was the first half-year increase in the German pig population since November 2020.

The number of breeding sows remained more or less stable between May 2023 and last November at 1.4 million animals. There are, however, significant regional differences. In North Rhine – Westphalia, the large region around Cologne bordering Belgium and the Netherlands, in the second half of last year the number of breeding sows increased by 6.4% while Bavaria in the very south of the country shows a decline of 4.9%. An explanation can be that pig holders in the various regio’s, the so-called Bundeslander, differently react to the stricter regulations for keeping of sows in stalls, Statistisch Bundesamt says.

The German pig industry has also to deal with an almost constant decrease of pork consumption, and the famous sausages. Although the sales of meat in general last year were almost at the same level as in 2022, the sales of pork in the groceries channels was 6.6% down, continuing a downwards trend that started over ten years ago. Germans now buy and eat on average 27.4 kilo of pork per head per year while that figure was 38.6 kilo/h/y in 2013.