The Director of Risk Management with h@ms Marketing Services says the USDA’s March Hogs and Pigs Report holds positive news for North American hog producers.
The USDA’s Quarterly Hogs and Pigs Report, released Friday, indicates the United States inventory of all hogs and pigs March 1, 2016 was up slightly from March 1, 2015, but down 1 percent from December 1, 2015, the breeding inventory was down slightly from last year and the previous quarter while the Market hog inventory was up slightly from last year but down 1 percent from last quarter.
Tyler Fulton, the Director of Risk Management with h@ms Marketing Services, says numbers across the board probably came in under most analysts expectations.
There’s really no indication of significant retention of gilts or added breeding stock. The report is generally pretty flat in all of the 3 major categories which would be all hogs and pigs and then the kept for breeding and then market separately. They all came in pretty much exactly the same as what they were last year so it really doesn’t show any trend of expansion, which is definitely a positive thing.
Generally speaking Canadian hog producers do not want to see the North American herd grow significantly because, with added supply, comes some downturn in prices. To be honest we’re struggling to move all of the pork both domestically and in export markets currently so it’s almost a sigh of relief to see that there’s really no strong indications of big numbers coming down the pipe. ~ Tyler Fulton – h@ms Marketing Services
Fulton says the low Canadian dollar ha helped Canadian producers in a big way and that seems to be the case for the foreseeable future.
He notes, where U.S. hog producers have struggled to make a profit hog producers in western Canada made a small profit and, while prices are expected to drop into the fall, Canadian producers can still hedge values that are profitable.
