Frozen pork inventory up

MANILA, Philippines — The country’s inventory of frozen pork slightly increased in the third week of February as imports remained high, the National Meat Inspection Service (NMIS) said.

Latest NMIS figures showed that the inventory of frozen pork in accredited cold storages reached 57,712.41 metric tons (MT) as of Feb.21, higher than the 57,069.66 MT the previous week.

The figure is also more than double the 21,668.55 MT of frozen pork in the same period last year.

Imported frozen pork accounted for the bulk of the inventory at 56,416.56 MT.

In contrast, local frozen pork only had a share of 1,295.85 MT in the inventory.

Central Luzon had the highest share of frozen imported pork at 20,899.62 MT.

This was followed by the CALABARZON with 15,979.33 MT. The region accounted for the largest share of local pork at 458.29 MT.

The National Capital Region also had a sizable share of the frozen imported pork at 13,637.90 MT.

The Department of Agriculture (DA) earlier said the supply of pork in the country was slowly stabilizing, driven by enhanced production and supply augmentation from other countries, supported by measures against the African swine fever (ASF).

Agriculture Secretary William Dar said there is enough pork supply in the country following efforts to strengthen and enhance local production and augment it through the support from other countries.

The DA noted that there has been an increase in the country’s hog inventory from a year ago.

It cited figures from the Philippine Statistics Authority showing that the country’s hog inventory stood at 9.8 million heads in January, higher than the 9.1 million heads registered in the same month in 2021.

Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) director Reildrin Morales said this was primarily due to the initiatives and efforts of the private sector, swine raisers’ groups, and professional veterinary associations that continued to battle the threat of ASF with the government.

“These efforts, implemented in partnership with LGUs, have been instrumental in keeping the industry alive,” Morales said.

According to the DA, only 20 barangays registered active ASF cases as of Feb. 17.

With the increase in hog population, the DA said pork supply has slowly stabilized, as production from local raisers across the country is augmented by frozen items sourced from other countries.

“These imported products are kept in cold storages and will be released to simply augment the supply gap. This is never meant to compete with the local producers,” Morales said.

The prevailing price of kasim or pork ham in Metro Manila markets stood at P320 per kilo on Thursday, lower than the P340 per kilo price a month ago.

The price of liempo or pork bellywas registered at P375 a kilo, slightly lower than the P380 per kilo price last month.