Grain prices reduce Hungarian pig numbers
Pigs are becoming scarcer in Hungary due to high feed prices and competition from industrial farms in the West.
With global grains prices projected to rise by 20 to 50% by 2016, according to an OECD survey published last year, smaller farms in eastern Europe will find it increasingly difficult to compete with their bigger, more efficient rivals in France, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands and Italy. This has led to a fallen number of pigs of 3.86 million animals from 8-10 million in the 1980s.
Data released by the Agriculture Ministry last month showed that since 2003, one year before Hungary’s entry into the European Union, 200,000 smallholders went out of business.
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