Study published into resource efficiency of the UK pig sector
The first ever study into the environmental impact and resource efficiency of the UK pig sector has been completed and warns that the growing pressures on the industry will see production moved overseas.
The project, undertaken by RAC Environment, was made possible by a £141,977 grant from Biffaward, a multi-million pound environment fund managed by the Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts, which utilises landfill tax credits donated by Biffa Waste Services. The report forms part of the Biffaward Mass Balance Programme. The aim of this programme is to inform environmental policy by providing accessible, well-researched information about the flows of different resources through the UK economy based either singly, or on a combination of regions, material streams or industry sectors.
The pig sector study found that UK consumption of pig meat is static, with imports increasing. If the UK pig industry is to have a future within the market place it must have an impact on consumer demands for pig products, encouraging consumption of home-produced foods. However, it is likely that integrated businesses will increasingly move production and primary processing to sites overseas if the differential costs of infrastructure development remain so heavily weighted against the UK.
The report also found that:
Nearly 60% of the bacon eaten in the UK is imported, the most important suppliers being Denmark and the Netherlands.
Consumers now purchase 76% of pork and 86% of bacon from multiple retailers - the supermarkets. This is a very different story from that of the 1960s, when the high street butcher was the dominant force in the supply of fresh meat products.
China accounts for more than half the world's pork production and consumption.
Approximately 75% of the pig is directly consumed in one form or other, the remainder is recycled, the vast majority ending up at rendering plants, which process the majority of animal by-products.
In the region of 7,817,527 tonnes of slurry and manure are excreted annually by the UK national pig herd. Effective recycling of this valuable resource to land will reduce the amount of 'artificial' nitrogen content applied to growing crops and sequestrate carbon in the national soil resource.
The £141,977 Biffaward grant included a £14,197 contribution from the Meat and Livestock Commission. Under Government regulations only 90 per cent of a grant can be provided from landfill tax – the remaining 10 per cent must come from another source.
Martin Bettington, Chairman of Biffaward, said: "To think that pig meat is the most popular source of meat protein in the world and until now little has been quantified about the resource flows through the sector. This project has provided an excellent understanding, making a huge contribution to the wider mass balance UK programme. RAC Environment has also provided the opportunity for the sector to establish benchmarks for environmental performance at a variety of levels throughout the supply chain."
Peter Danks, said: "At a producer level the UK pig industry needs to be able to invest in plant and machinery to reduce its impact on the environment and at the same time reduce costs. Taken with existing improvements in the feed and processing sub-sectors, which have already taken some steps to reduce waste, this would put British pork amongst the global leaders in environment-friendly meat production."
