Meat imports down 8.6% in September

MANILA, Philippines — The country’s overall meat imports continued to drop at end-September as pork and beef shipments registered declines for most of the year.

Latest data from the Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) showed the country imported 923.16 million kilos of meat and meat products in nine months ending September, 8.6 percent lower than the 1.01 billion kilos in the same period last year.

Pork – which accounted for almost half of the total volume – saw a 15.87 percent drop in shipments to 458.7 million kilos.

Pork offals – or internal organs – were the most imported pork products at 170.56 million kilos, followed by pork cuts at 163.14 million kilos.

Spain remained as the top source of pork products at 112.35 million kilos, followed by Canada at 85.93 million kilos, and Brazil at 78.24 million kilos.

Figures from BAI also showed that beef  imports, which accounted for 13.34 percent of the total, decreased  by 20.8 percent to 106.68 million kilos from 134.69 million kilos.

Among the beef products, beef cuts accounted for the majority at 67.71 million kilos followed by fats at 18.34 million kilos.

Brazil is the top source of beef shipments with 40.64 million kilos while the country imported 30.88 million kilos from Australia, making it the second top source.

Chicken – the second most imported meat product at 29.9 percent – registered a 10.59-percent rise in imports to 324.98 million kilos.

Mechanically deboned chicken meat was the top imported product with 178.46 million kilos, followed by chicken leg quarters with 85.16 million kilos.

The top two sources of chicken meat were Brazil with 186.13 million kilos and the US at 116.97 million kilos.

Buffalo imports – which accounted for 3.49 percent of the total – declined by 10.26 percent to 31.66 million kilos from 35.28 million kilos.

The country did not ship any duck meat in September, maintaining the volume at 229,302 kilos, still a four-fold jump from 58,782 kilos in the same period last year.

Lamb meat shipments reached 642,883 kilos, up 18.22 percent from 543,806 kilos last year.

As for turkey, shipments dropped by 31.03 percent to 270,456 kilos from 392,151 kilos last year.