Anatomy of a changed industry: key figures on America's pork sector

摘要

A landmark was passed in the USA at the end of 1999. New statistics about the national pork industry, issued by the US department of agriculture, showed fewer than 98 500 pig units to be operating nationwide 3/4 the first time that the total had dropped below 100 000. Despite a 4.5 percent decline in on-farm inventory during the year to 59.41 million pigs, average unit size passed 600 pigs per enterprise. Back in 1990 there were almost 275 500 pig-producing operations in the USA and they averagedfewer than 200 pigs each. Ten years before that, the 1980 total had been close to 670 500 units while the average was under 100 pigs/farm. Other data, from the vast amounts collected for one of the most comprehensively documented pig sectors in the world, all point in the same direction. Just about every modem aspect of producing and processing pigs in the USA shows very little resemblance to the situation nationally at the start of the last decade. The business has not so much changed as undergone a complete metamorphosis.