overview
The United States is the world's second largest producer, consumer, exporter, and importer of pork and pork products. Pork accounts for about a fourth of domestic meat consumption, with imports accounting for about 5 percent of that. Exports account for about 6 percent of domestic production.

The U.S. hog herd stands at nearly 60 million animals, with about 68 percent of them in the Corn Belt area, where they have access to that region's abundant supplies of feed grains and soybean meal. Another 20 percent of hogs are produced in the Southeast. ERS analyzes conditions and events relating to the domestic and global pork markets that influence supply, demand, trade, and prices.

contents

• Background
• Trade
• Market outlook
• Policy

features 
U.S. 2003 and 2004 Livestock and Poultry Trade Influenced by Animal Disease and Trade Restrictions discusses how animal diseases and disease-related trade restrictions have influenced trade in animal products in the past few years, with an emphasis on 2003 and forecasts for 2004. Disease outbreaks and related trade restrictions have slowed previously expected high growth in many U.S. animal product exports, with U.S. beef exports most affected.

Livestock, Dairy and Poultry Outlook provides a monthly analysis of current developments in the livestock and poultry industry, providing data on animal numbers, meat and egg production, prices, trade, and net returns. Pork is a featured commodity in January, April, July, and October.

recommended readings
Annual summaries of the forces that shaped the animal products industries during the previous year and how those forces are expected to affect the current year's outlook are available from the Livestock, Dairy, and Poultry Outlook page. Instead of providing a separate report covering all the commodities once a year, we will release summaries for the various commodities in the newsletter as information becomes available.

Beef and Pork Values and Prices Spreads Explained examines how marketing costs affect livestock and meat prices in the short and long run. Slow price adjustment explains most of the month-to-month changes in beef and pork price spreads.

Savvy Buyers Spur Food Safety Innovations in Meat Processing finds that the market incentives that motivate private firms to invest in food safety innovation seem to be fairly weak. Results from an ERS survey of U.S. meat and poultry slaughter and processing plants and two case studies of innovation in the U.S. beef industry reveal development of a number of mechanisms to overcome that weakness and to stimulate investment in food safety innovation. For the full report, see Food Safety Innovation in the United States: Evidence from the Meat Industry.

See all recommended readings...

recommended data products
Retail scanner prices for meat contains monthly average retail price data for selected cuts of beef, pork, poultry, lamb, and veal, based on electronic supermarket scanner data.

Standard summary tables provide average retail prices (weighted by quantity purchased) for meat cuts reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
A searchable database, which contains a wider variety of meat cuts, allows users to create custom tables that can be saved as *.csv or *.html files. The tables report monthly weighted-average prices, an index of volume sold (with the monthly average for 2001=100), and the percent of volume sold with feature discounts.

Meat Price Spreads contains data on retail, wholesale, and farm values for pork and the price spreads for these values, as well as information on average U.S. prices of some retail pork cuts.

Red Meat Yearbook presents monthly, quarterly, and annual data on commercial livestock slaughter and meat production; livestock and meat prices and price indexes; inventories of cattle, hogs, and sheep; and meat supply and utilization.

Given the revised, higher estimates of U.S. population from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, Department of Commerce, USDA estimates of per capita consumption values for food products are lower than previously reported. According to the new population estimates, the U.S. population for 2001 is about 3 percent larger than earlier thought. Per capita consumption data for red meat and poultry through 2001 are found in revised supply and utilization tables.

Hog Costs and Returns includes hog costs and returns estimates for 2000-01. The data are collected in a national survey of hog producers as part of USDA's Agricultural Resource Management Survey (ARMS).

Foreign Agricultural Trade of the United States (FATUS) provides U.S. agricultural exports and imports, volume and value, by country, by commodity, and by calendar year, fiscal year, and month, for varying periods, such as 1935 to the present or 1989 to the present. Updated monthly or annually.

Production, Supply, and Distribution (PS&D) contains official USDA data on production, supply, and distribution of agricultural commodities for the United States and major importing and exporting countries. The database provides projections for the coming year and historical data for more than 200 countries and major crop, livestock, fishery, and forest products.

related briefing rooms
Animal production and marketing issues
Agricultural baseline projections
Conservation and environmental policy
Food CPI, prices, and expenditures
Food marketing and price spreads
Farm income and costs
Food market structures
Global resources and productivity
Canada
Mexico
North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)

related links
The Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) hogs and pork page contains links to publications, charts, and information on international trade. Of particular interest is Livestock and Poultry: World Markets and Trade.

National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) provides data on inventories, production, stocks, balance sheets, and prices by State and nationally, as well as commodity-specific reports.

Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) provides current cash grain and livestock prices, and market news.

See all related links...

for more information, contact: Mildred Haley or Leland Southard
web administration: webadmin@ers.usda.gov
page updated: September 14, 2004