The UK national pig herd has dropped by more than half a million animals in the past 5 years. However, following the resumption of trade between Britain and China there is a growing market for British pigs in the world’s largest livestock producer. image expired

Trade in pigs between China and Britain was banned in 2007 following the foot and mouth outbreak, but resumed last year, with a deal to export 2,000 live pigs from Yorkshire. This year four and a half thousand pigs are being flown to China. According to the National Pig Association several thousand more are in the pipeline for next year.  

Glenn Dams, managing director of JSR genetics, one of two UK companies exporting live pigs to China, explained that the business is arduous but profitable. He said the pigs have to be quarantined for 30 days before and after their flight and must be vaccinated against multiple diseases.

Dams said trade was good because the UK herd has long been held in high regard for its efficiency and quality breeding programmes. He claimed ‘technified’ pigs - animals which are suited to intensive operations - around the world are mainly developed from British stock. He continued that there was a market for well-bred animals which will grow efficiently in Chinese systems, to feed the country’s increasing demand for meat.

Welfare implications of trade resumption

Despite the lucrative trade opportunities it brings, several groups have expressed concern over the systems into which the pigs are being exported. Animal welfare in China does not meet the high standards of the UK and some have posited that the exported pigs will be the subject to cruel treatment in China, which is home to half of the World’s sows.

Responding to challenges on BBC Radio 4’s Farming Today, Dams denied the exported pigs would be treated inhumanely, although he did acknowledge, “There are different standards and assurances” and conceded the exported animals could be confined to stalls and experience other practices which are not legal in the UK. He said that welfare was down to the stockperson, not the system and claimed the stockpeople in the units where his pigs were destined would be well trained.

However, contrary to Mr Dams’ assurances, Compassion in World Farming said that, in response to the growing demand for meat in the country, factory farm systems with poor welfare considerations are growing fast in China.

CIWF is currently working with various stakeholders in China to improve animal welfare and raise awareness of the benefits of higher welfare farming, including reducing the risks of disease and strain on the environment.