In China, swine fever has been rampant for months and this also has consequences for the price structure in Germany. Because demand from the People's Republic is increasing enormously, the battle prices are rising. Everywhere importers from China buy pork - in Brazil, the USA and also in Europe.
While German farmers are happy about higher slaughter prices, consumers have to dig deeper into the butcher's shop for schnitzel, roast meat and sausage. Pork prices rose 8.3 percent in September compared to the same month last year, according to Thomas Els of the Agricultural Market Information Society (AMI).
Total meat and sausage prices increased by 5.4 percent during this period. So the kilogram of pork today costs 5.81 euros - a year ago, it was still 5.38 euros. The price of pork schnitzel climbed from 7.10 euros to 7.39 euros. For pork roast currently has to be paid 6.18 euros per kilogram. A year ago it was still 5.60 euros.
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For pig farmers, this is good news because they can produce better cost-effective. According to Matthias Quaing, market expert at the Interessengemeinschaft der Schweinehalter Deutschlands (ISN), the battle price rose from 1.50 euros last year to 1.85 euros per kilogram. "The pig farmers also know that it can be very different in a year or two," said Quaing.
China is the world's largest producer and consumer of pork. Swine fever has caused gigantic damage in the country. There has been rampant for a year, the African swine flu. The treacherous virus is harmless to humans, but it is quickly deadly to the animals. "It's the most dangerous disease the pig industry has ever experienced," said expert Cui Ernan of business consultant GavekalDragonomics in Beijing. Half of the pig population in China has already been destroyed. Nor is the world market sufficient to fill the supply gap in the most populous country.
China will not recover quickly from the swine flu and devastating consequences for pig farming, said expert Cui Ernan. "The challenge of the disease will continue for another five, ten, or more years," she said. She advocates a transformation from the now widespread in China small farmers to large farms with strict biological controls.
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So far, China's swine fever has caused more than a trillion yuan, or 127 billion euros, of direct economic damage, according to Li Defa of China's Agricultural University. The calculation came only to the public, because courageous journalists reported it.
The true extent of the plague is hushed up by the Chinese leadership. This is typical for dealing with such crises in China, but always prevents a fast and effective approach. Only a year after the first case in August 2018, Deputy Prime Minister Hu Chunhua admitted: "The real epidemic situation is far worse than we were aware of."
Compensation paid to affected farmers was still low this summer, with little incentive for them to report an outbreak. Slaughtering the animals and selling the infected meat secretly and quickly on the market was always more lucrative for the breeders, which contributed to the further spread of swine fever in the country.
