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Edgar Vhera
Agriculture Specialist Writer
STAKEHOLDERS in the pig industry have lamented the high cost of production against a decline in average selling price this festive season, which left many of them in the red and unable to recoup.
A smallholder pig producer from Goromonzi, Mr Tapiwa Takawira said many pig farmers were caught between a rock and hard place characterised by low output prices against high cost of production rendering their businesses unprofitable.
“In the past, the average on farm cost of production was averaging US$2, 20 per kilogramme but this has shot up to US$2, 95.
“We used to cut on production cost by buying feed concentrate and mix with on-farm maize, but due to the El-Nino induced drought, there is no maize and we are buying expensive straight feeds,” he said.
The pig industry is generally characterised by two pricing regimes in any calendar year – the peak and off-peak periods.
Mr Takawira disclosed that the festive season, which spans from October to February was the peak price period with average pork wholesale prices ranging between US$3, 60 and US$3, 75 per kilogramme. The off-peak period from March to September usually has an average price of US$2, 80 per kilogramme.
About 60 percent of pig producers are small-scale.
Brokers’ influence on pork pricing, high slaughter fees, market glut, water and pollution challenges, shortages, smuggling of cheaper pork and pork products from neighbouring countries are some of the challenges bedeviling the sector.
“Pig slaughter charges have risen from an average of US$5 per beast to the current US$12 and small-scale farmers’ viability has been impacted negatively,” added Mr Takawira.
He said the country risked depending on pork imports thereby losing out on the gains the industry had made under the National Development Strategy 1 (NDS1).
Livestock and Meat Advisory Council (LMAC) executive administrator, Dr Reneth Mano concurred saying the pork industry has been hardest hit by a combination of higher than usual cost of feeds in a drought year and the shift of pork from value added tax (VAT) exemption to a standard rated food subject to 15 percent when sold through VAT registered abattoirs and retail outlets.
“Falling discretionary real income of lower income households with highly elastic demand for meat also meant that pig farmers ended up absorbing almost all of the rising cost of feed and the rising cost of money, as well as 100 percent of the 15 percent VAT introduced in January 2023,” said Dr Mano.
He said smallholder commercial pig farmers supplying pork to most rural townships and growth points have struggled to get feed since last year.
“These farmers are used to making their own feeds through buying locally available maize and oilseeds to formulate. The drought caused local maize prices to rise by more than 100 percent for most pig farmers from the normal range of US$240 to US$350 per tonne to between US$360 and US$700,” he added.
Pork demand has suffered as well from the abundance of cheap beef on the informal rural and urban markets coming from a distressed drought-hit smallholder cattle farming community.
Dr Mano said the country’s biggest pork brands have not been spared, as they suffered their biggest loss in domestic market share with the supermarket route to markets suffering further losses in competitiveness to the informal route.
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