Price of meat ups despite production rise last year

Meat production amounted to about 400 million kilograms in 2019, almost two per cent more than in 2018, according to the Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke).

Both the production of beef and pork increased by one per cent from the previous year, while the production of poultry meat increased by three per cent.

The beef, pork and poultry meat producer prices also increased slightly.

Beef production increased by one per cent to just under 88 million kilograms. The production volume of beef last exceeded the 2019 figure in 2007.

The average slaughter weight of bulls increased by eight kilograms and that of heifers by nine kilograms from the previous year. However, the number of cattle slaughtered decreased from the previous year apart from the slaughters of heifers which increased slightly.

“The producer price of beef remained relatively stable for the whole of last year. The average price paid to producers for meat from bulls was EUR 3.52 per kilogram, i.e. almost the same as in the previous year. The producer prices of meat from cows and heifers increased by 1–2 per cent,” said Sirpa Karppinen, Senior Statistician at Luke.

The average price paid to producers for fattening pigs was EUR 1.61 per kilogram, i.e. four per cent higher than in the previous year. The producer price of fattening pigs developed rather steadily last year. In December, the producer price of fattening pigs was at its highest, and producers were paid EUR 1.64 per kilogram.

Pork production amounted to just over 171 million kilograms, one per cent more than in 2018. More pigs were slaughtered than in the previous year, and the average carcass weight of fattening pigs increased to just over 91 kilograms.

“The production of poultry meat continued to increase last year, and was a little over 139 million kilograms. Both the production of broiler meat and turkey meat increased by three per cent from the previous year. The production of poultry meat has been increasing constantly for the last ten years, and the production volume was last year over 45 per cent bigger than ten years ago,” said Sanna Vuorisalo, Senior Statistician at Luke.

The producer price of broiler meat was EUR 1.36 per kilogram, three per cent higher than in the previous year.

The production of mutton took a slight downward turn last year. About 1.5 million kilograms of mutton was produced, which was just over two per cent less than in 2018. The producer price of lamb also decreased slightly from the previous year. Last year slaughterhouses paid on average EUR 3.77 per kilogram of lamb.