Pork exports show improvement in September

by | Nov 16, 2015 | 5 Ag Stories, Audio, News

Pork exports show improvements in September. Joe Schuele with U.S. Meat Export Federation says there were several reasons pork exports were higher in September.

?We did see an uptick in September. Those are the recent numbers we have out and it was our best month we?ve had in a while so we?re hoping to set up for a stronger fourth quarter. We?ve also in that couple of weeks we?ve had seven processing plants and for cold storage facilities re-instate exports to China. China is kind of in a pork buying mode and we?d like to better capitalize on that which will hopefully make for a stronger fourth quarter,? Schuele said.

Schuele said Mexico has been top performer this year.

?We had very strong sales to Mexico in September which was a bright spot. We also saw some rebound in the Latin America markets like Chile, Guatemala, and Honduras. Those were very good performers for us. We?ve also seen our prices come together a little bit. For a long time this year, we saw a lot of European pork going out at very low prices to Asian markets. It was difficult to compete with and have now seen some moderations where prices have converged a bit,? Schuele said.

Schuele said the reason Europe could sell so low is because most of the countries had a very week currency.

January through September, U.S. pork exports were down 4 percent from a year ago in volume and value was down 17 percent.