EU pork exports to Asia continued to grow sharply in October, achieving the highest monthly figure in records back to 2002, according to BPEX.
Quoting the latest figures from Eurostat, which show a 12% year-on-year increase in EU pork exports in October, BPEX point out that this highlights the scale of excess supplies available on the European pig market.
Major movers during the month were China, up 16% on October 2013, and South Zorea, where the volume of pork taken from EU suppliers has trebled from 8,500 tonnes in October 2013 to 25,600 in the same month this year.
Although Japan is starting to pull in more imports from the US, reducing the EU’s share of that market, Hong Kong and the Philippines both continued to increase their intake of EU pork, highlighting the significance of Asia to the continent’s exporters since the introduction of the Russian ban on EU imports.
“As such,” said BPEX, “the five Asian markets currently account for 62% of total export sales, up from 50% in October 2013. The value of EU exports in October totalled €399.9m (£313.9m), up 9% year on year.”