Label of origin rule likely to decrease exports of Canadian hogs to US

The final US mandatory Country of Origin Labelling (COOL) rule issued earlier this month is likely to reduce shipments of live Canadian hogs to the United States, but increase exports of finished Canadian pork. Enforcement of the rule begins in April.

“My expectation is we’re probably going to see fewer hogs coming south into the United States and more pork,” says Dr Ron Plain, University of Missouri (USA) economist. “In fact, we seem to be trending up a little bit in hog slaughter in Canada,” he says in Farmscape online.

“I think when we look at the complications associated with record keeping and labelling and verifying the correct label that lots of times it’s going to end up more sensible and lower cost to slaughter hogs in Canada and send the pork south already labelled than it will be to send the hogs south,” Plain says.

“If you try to handle animals from more than one country on the same day, it becomes a real record keeping segregation challenge unless you’re going to just label it all US and Canada, so a lot of plants are wanting to go with only one label,” he adds.

USDA lowers corn price estimate

The US Department of Agriculture lowered its 2008-09 average corn price estimate to a range of $3.55 to $4.25/bushel in a 12 January report, 10 cents below the previous month’s estimate. The World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) place this year’s soybean prices at $8.50 to $9.50 per bushel compared with an estimate of $8.25 to $9.75/bushel last month. Soybean meal prices are projected at $250 to $310 per short ton, up $10 on both ends of the range. On wheat, the projected season-average farm price is narrowed 10 cents on both ends of the range to a projection of of $6.50 to $6.90/bushel.

On coarse grains, USDA reduced feed and residual use by 50 million bushels, reflecting lower animal numbers and September-November disappearance as indicated by 1 December stocks. In addition, the department lowered ethanol use by 100 million bushels as sustained negative ethanol production margins have reduced incentives for ethanol output.

Looking at other crops, the sorghum season average farm price is lowered 10 cents to $2.90 to $3.50/bushel; barley narrowed 10 cents to $4.95 to $5.35/bushel; and the estimate for oats was raised 10 cents to $2.90 to $3.10.

The WASDE report reflects a lower meat production estimate from the previous month, with reduced 2009 broiler and pork production. Beef production forecasts for 2009 are unchanged.

Mong Reththy Group pork project to include feedmill

The Mong Reththy Group in Cambodia has plans for a pork project that also includes adding a feedmill with a projected output of 330,000 metric tons per year. In addition to boosting local pork production, the project would increase the incomes of corn, cassava and soybean farmers, while creating employment and new opportunities for production, says Kao Phal, director of the Animal Health and Production Department at the Ministry of Agriculture. Mong Reththy has set up a new company called M’s Pig ACMC in association with UK breeder ACMC, with which it has agreed a 20-year franchise deal. ACMC will deliver 600 breeding pigs for a new unit on a five-hectare site in the Prey Nop district of Sihanoukville, Cambodia, which will house a nucleus herd. Eventually this unit will supply enough commercial AC1 sows to produce 1.1 million slaughter pigs per year by 2015. The project also involves a slaughter/process plant for the pigs.