Compound feed production for farmed animals in the EU-28 fell by 1% on the year, in 2016, settling at 153.4 million tonnes, according to data provided by FEFAC, the European animal feed industry body which represents approximately 4,000 European compound feed manufacturers.
Broken down into individual categories, the decline included a 1.5% fall in cattle feed production, a 1.6% fall for pig feed and a 0.2% reduction in poultry feed.
“On the pig feed side, after two years of moderate growth, the production decrease in 2016 can partly be explained by the effects of African Swine Fever (ASF) in Eastern Europe,” said FEFAC, adding that ASF “weighed heavily” on the development of pigmeat production.
The pig sector decline was also linked, by FEFAC, to “low market prices for pigmeat in the first half of 2016 and a large availability of feed grade cereals at low prices which benefitted on-farm mixing”.