Beta-agonist debate in Thailand

摘要

Thailand currently has about 600 000 sows, each of them capable of giving between 14-16 pigs for sale per year at present national rates of productivity. The average cost of producing a kilogram of liveweight is generally estimated to be around 10 percent more than in the USA. That is becoming an important difference because Thai processors find that they could, in theory, buy a container load of American pork for the same price as they would pay for the live animals produced locally. The timetableof tariff reductions demanded by Thailand's membership of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) will allow far more pigmeat to be imported than the derisory amounts brought in so far. An additional pressure on local producers comes from the search by Thai supermarkets for sources of quality lean pork, which many believe to be most readily obtainable through imports.