The Australian pork industry is calling on the Federal Government to increase restrictions on pork imports.
Pig farmers say they are struggling to keep afloat, with high feed grain prices, and returns which are below the cost of production due to cheap imports. The farmers say they have also had to meet the costs of adopting an animal welfare code, quality assurance scheme and environmental standards.
Subsidised agriculture
Australian Pork Limited’s Andrew Spencer says US importers do not face the same costs and European imports are also hurting. “The imports we have coming from Europe are coming from countries that have heavily subsidised agriculture, and that is having an impact on their cost of production for pigmeat in particular,” he said. “And we believe that there’s subsidised pork coming in from Denmark, we’re not happy about that because we don’t believe it’s fair so we’d like to see something done about that.”
Related website:
Australian Pork Limited
To receive the free pig newsletter click here
(Source: ABC.net.au)