Russian pig farming will receive unprecedented public support

New Russian Minister of Agriculture Nikolay Fedorov stated at a recent conference that the existing pig farming support programme is insufficient and Russia should invest more in the industry in the coming years.

“Russia’s WTO accession will require investment in the pig industry to the amount of 140 billion rubles (US$ 4.66 bln) over the next 2-3 years. If we don’t do that then by 2020 the industry will become uncompetitive and domestic pork producers will be replaced by Western business” Nikolai Fedorov said on Saturday at the Collegium of the Ministry of Agriculture.

“This is a serious threat that we must anticipate and take appropriate action,” the minister added.

“Despite the fact that the industry is reviving after its collapse in the early 2000s, only 20 pig enterprises in the country are able to truly compete with foreign producers in terms of cost of their production. Today, almost 40% of pork in the country, and some say its even more, is produced in private farms without the use of modern technologies,” said the minister.

Qualitative reconstruction of the industry is possible only through large-scale investments, the creation of new businesses and updating existing businesses, the minister pointed out. In his opinion it is also necessary to take a number of measures to protect domestic producers in terms of Russia’s WTO membership.

In addition, the Ministry of Agriculture in cooperation with the National Union of Breeders is developing proposals to stimulate the construction of processing complexes and deep processing of pork with a total capacity of up to 2 million head per year.

The industry expects the growth of imports of pork and fears for the fate of agricultural holdings as well as private farms with Russia joining the WTO. This was recently announced by the general director of the National Union of Pig Breeders Yury Kovalev. He has called for either renegotiation of the WTO terms of entry for Russia or the use of enhanced protective measures against imports of pigs.

Source: Vladislav Vorotnikov