The announcement that we will export pork to the EU market again after 30 years, as well as the story more than a year ago that our pork will reach as far as China, created doubts in the public about our chances for foreign trade, as there is continuing dissatisfaction of breeders market opportunities due to the low price of live weight of fatteners and large imports of pork, which is why farmers are reducing livestock from year to year.
Our country has close to 2.8 million pigs, and we produce between 250,000 and 300,000 tons of meat a year.
It is certain that we will not be able to export live pigs for some time to come, because the obligatory vaccination against classical swine fever was abolished in our country only a year ago (December 15, 2019).
Professor of the Faculty of Agriculture in Novi Sad and member of the Board of the Ministry of Agriculture for drafting a new law on animal husbandry, Dr. Ivan Radovic, says for “Dnevnik” that when talking about this topic, the question first arises where we will be able to sell pork and only then whether domestic pig breeding meets the conditions for pork to be found on the tables of foreign consumers. He notes that the European market is congested, and that the Russian market is becoming more and more self-sufficient because large-capacity pig farms have been built in Russia in recent years, and as for the Chinese market, there is no slaughterhouse registered in Serbia for pork exports to China.
Pig farming as an industrial branch can contribute to the development of rural parts of the country, through the production of piglets on commercial farms and organized production of fatteners.
This production should be based on the quality of fatteners on the slaughter line, where control and measurement will be done by an independent institution that will measure meat content and pay fatteners on that basis, which is also one of the measures to spread pig farming and break the prejudice that we are not ready for export.
The professor estimates that the abolition of the obligatory vaccination of pigs against classical swine fever in the last decades is the best decision regarding the development of pig breeding.
When the market is opened for fatteners, then farmers are put in a better position because they can negotiate directly with interested slaughterhouses abroad, says prof. Dr. Radović.
At the beginning of the conversation, our interlocutor points out that in Serbia there are better preconditions for the development of that branch because we have less than 0.2 conditional heads per hectare and thus enough space to expand that production, unlike many European countries. But he also notes that profitable pig farming is not a data from the statistical yearbook, but that pig farming is an industry that must comply with all regulations of the profession to be efficient and that we have results in this regard, and thus a good chance to be among exporters again after three decades in EU.
Pig farming should be monitored through controlled industrial-type production, which is largely implemented today, especially in Vojvodina. From the adoption of the Main Breeding Program in 2010 until today, when the third Main Breeding Program is active, there is an evident increase in quality producers who implement all technology measures prescribed by the profession and thus get quality breeding heads. The main breeding program is prescribed by the Law on Animal Husbandry, and the state has emphasized that this branch of animal husbandry is guided through pre-defined goals and prescribed programs. The very existence of the Main Breeding Program at the national level has preserved the number of the most important category, which are purebred sows and f-1 generation, which, unlike the surrounding countries, preserves national production and creates opportunities for pig breeding to develop, emphasizes Prof. Dr. Radovic, Dnevnik reports.
