PRODUCTION OF LIVE PIGS IN POLAND – CONDITIONS AND PROSPECTS

Abstract

The article presents the current situation of Polish farms oriented towards pig breeding,resulting from a drastic reduction in the pig population after 2007 which took place in farms holding upto 200 pigs. The assessment covered the production and economic activity of pig farms, by determiningtheir efficiency and competitiveness against a background of similar farms from Germany, Denmark,the Netherlands and Spain. The results of analyses show that the major factor determining productionefficiency and competitiveness of Polish pig farms was the production scale stemming from a very lowlevel of breeding concentration in comparison with farms from countries analysed. In 2013, on average,on Polish farms, there were 41 pigs, while in Denmark, the Netherlands and Germany, there were 3096,2285 and 587 pigs, respectively. Large Polish farms (economic size of EUR 100-500 thousand SO)were able to compete and very large farms were fully competitive. The major causes of a weak Polishpig production sector have been indicated and include a low level of concentration, no links betweenpig producers and commercial/meat processing plants as well as the existence of barriers preventinginvestment in livestock buildings adapted to a greater production scale.

Keywords

• pig population
• pig farms
• production of live pigs
• competitiveness