Chronicle of raw materials

Livestock feed: prices weigh on livestock

Audio 01:42

In France the cost of poultry feed has increased by 30% since the start of the war in Ukraine.

It had already increased by 40% between last August and February.

(Illustrative image) Scott Olson/Getty Images/AFP

By: Marie-Pierre Olphand Follow

2 mins

Already very high before the war, the prices of cattle feed made from grain and meal have exploded over the past three months.

Production costs weigh more and more heavily on animal husbandry.

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The Spanish case is emblematic of what is happening on the market today: the country is the leading European pork producer and imports 40% of the corn used in livestock feed from Ukraine.

Due to a lack of supplies, several farms took the decision in the spring to slaughter their piglets.

Too uncertain and too expensive to feed them for six months.

In Germany, the other big pork producer, volumes fell by 10% according to Jean-Paul Simier, economist of the meat sector.

With such an expensive grain, breeding is no longer profitable.

Especially since the German pork industry is facing other difficulties, particularly in terms of manpower.

30% increase since the Russian offensive

In France, the cost of poultry feed has increased by 30% since the start of the war.

It had already increased by 40% between last August and February.

And when you know that almost two-thirds of the cost of producing white meat is its diet, the calculations are quickly made.

Unlike pigs, poultry grow on a short cycle, so they will not be slaughtered, but explains an expert Yann Nedelec, director of ANVOL l'Interprofession Poultry, some farms will pause, "

.

Farms already tested by a wave of avian flu.

Less corn and less sunflower meal

In addition to supplying 15% of the world's maize, Ukraine was also, until then, an essential supplier of high-protein sunflower meal.

According to the Cyclops 2022 report, an annual reference work on world markets, European farms should have imported 2.3 million tonnes of Ukrainian and Russian meal for the 2021/2022 campaign.

A partially blocked volume.

The food that will not be exported could be temporarily replaced by Brazilian soybeans.

But here again, prices will play the arbiter: soybean prices reached their highest level in ten years last week and will also weigh on the wallets of breeders.

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