Pork prices are declining. How to promote supply and demand balance?

Xinhua Insight | Pork Prices Decline: How to Promote Supply-Demand Balance

“The price of pork has dropped too much,” “Selling pigs incurs losses, but keeping them could lead to even greater losses”… Recently, pork prices in China have continued to decline. While consumers find pork more affordable, many farmers are suffering serious losses and are under significant pressure.

What is the current situation in the live pig market? What are the reasons behind the low prices? How should various parties respond? Reporters from “Xinhua Insight” recently conducted an investigation.

This is a price display board for pork taken on March 24 at the Xinfadi meat trading hall in Beijing. Photo by Xinhua reporter Gu Yiping.

Multiple Regions See Pork Prices Drop to Recent Lows

Recent investigations by reporters from Liaoning, Henan, Beijing, and other areas show that pork prices have reached their lowest levels in recent years, and they are accelerating downward after March.

On March 24, at a farmer’s market near Xuecheng Road in Hunnan District, Shenyang City, Liaoning Province, reporters observed that pork prices had fallen to around 10 yuan per jin, with promotional pork prices even lower than the prices of nearby green peppers, ginger, and garlic. Vendor Wang Hongliang stated that after the Spring Festival, pork prices had decreased by about 2 yuan per jin compared to the festival period. “While the low prices have attracted many citizens, fresh pork is a fast-moving consumer good, and daily sales have not increased much.”

“Since August 2025, the selling price of external three-breed live pigs has dropped from over 7 yuan per jin to now only over 5 yuan, which is the lowest price in many years,” said Huang Dan, head of Ruihui Industrial Co., Ltd. in Yiyang City, Hunan Province.

The head of the livestock division of the agricultural and rural affairs bureau in a certain county in Henan Province said that the local price of live pigs is currently between 4.7 yuan and 6 yuan per jin, which is not enough to cover costs even for self-bred and self-raised pigs. If labor costs are included, raising a pig could result in a loss of two to three hundred yuan.

According to data collected by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs from 500 county-level markets and collection points nationwide, in the third week of March 2026, the price of piglets was 26.2 yuan per kilogram, down 2.6% month-on-month and down 30% year-on-year; the price of live pigs was 11.05 yuan per kilogram, down 2.9% month-on-month and down 28% year-on-year; the price of pork was 22 yuan per kilogram, down 2.1% month-on-month and down 16.5% year-on-year.

Recently, a symposium organized by relevant departments of the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs for pig farming enterprises noted that due to the decline in consumer demand after the holiday, pork prices have dropped and have entered a warning zone for excessive declines.

Reporters learned that current pork prices have significantly dropped, while feed and other farming costs, although lower than in previous years, have increased compared to earlier this year, putting more pressure on farmers.

Zhong Changyin, general manager of Guangming Pig Industry Co., Ltd. in Zhengyang County, Henan Province, stated that the recent rise in oil and energy prices has driven up transportation costs, with soybean meal prices rising to over 3,000 yuan per ton, leading to increased pig feed costs. “Currently, our company is losing about 300 yuan per pig. If prices do not rise, based on last year’s breeding scale of 6,000 pigs, we may lose 2 million yuan this year.”

Industry insiders say that there are nearly 17 million existing pig farming entities in China, the vast majority of which are small and medium-sized farms. Over ten million people are directly engaged in pig farming, transportation, slaughtering, and sales. The low prices of pork will directly affect the income of these groups.

Supply High, Demand Weak

Many experts believe that the recent continuous decline in pork prices is the result of multiple intertwined factors.

—High supply of live pigs. Wang Zuli, a researcher at the Institute of Agricultural Economics and Development of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and a scientific expert in the national pig industry technology system, said that the current supply of live pigs is at a high level.

Live pig production has a fixed cycle, and changes in the number of breeding sows take about 10 months to translate into live pig output. Wang Zuli said that during the first half of last year, China’s pig production capacity was relatively high, coupled with significant improvements in pig production efficiency in recent years. Especially after the African swine fever epidemic, many farms not only improved their breeding pigs but also upgraded their facilities and equipment, significantly enhancing pig production capacity and disease prevention capabilities.

According to industry insiders, as early as the fourth quarter of 2024, relevant departments began guiding the industry to reduce pig production capacity based on statistical monitoring. Since last year, more efforts have been made to implement capacity monitoring and early warning, task decomposition, and notification to key provinces, as well as guidance meetings with leading enterprises, to promote a high-level adjustment of pig production capacity. Due to the inertia of pig production, the effects of capacity reduction will take time to manifest.

“Although the policy direction for reducing production capacity was clarified last year, implementation still faces challenges. For instance, some farming entities have a ‘survive to win’ mindset, especially during price increases when they are reluctant to actively reduce production,” said Zhu Zengyong, a researcher at the Beijing Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences.

It is worth noting that pork prices are particularly sensitive to market supply and demand. Zhu Zengyong explained that the supply of pork and market prices do not change in proportional relation; even a slight change in supply can trigger significant price fluctuations.

—Pork demand has entered a consumption off-season. “After the New Year, the market generally enters the off-season for pork consumption,” Wang Zuli explained. Many consumers tend to stock up on pork before the New Year, and after the Spring Festival, there will be a period of 1 to 2 months for digesting inventories, during which demand is relatively weak. In addition to seasonal factors, trends such as population aging, declining birth rates, and diversification of livestock product consumption are also continuously weakening overall pork demand.

—Market sentiment is low, accelerating the slaughter of live pigs. Industry insiders told reporters that the market sentiment regarding pork prices is relatively weak, and many farmers are not optimistic about short-term pork prices. When facing financial pressure, they tend to accelerate the pace of slaughter, causing supply pressure to increase in the short term and further driving down current pork prices.

Huang Dan informed reporters that the company is also accelerating the speed of live pig slaughter to exchange for cash flow to purchase feed.

Promoting Stable Operation of the Live Pig Market

Industry insiders, including Zhu Zengyong, believe that the current pressure on live pig supply will persist, and pork prices may generally remain low in the first half of this year. It is anticipated that as the effects of previous capacity adjustments gradually become evident and pork consumption emerges from the off-season, the supply-demand relationship in the live pig market is expected to improve in the second half of the year.

A representative from a large pig farming enterprise in the central region stated that under the current market conditions for live pigs, farming enterprises must find ways to reduce breeding costs, such as optimizing feed formulas, promoting intelligent feeding, and adjusting production capacity rhythms to enhance efficiency. There is hope to further reasonably expand the import channels for soybean meal and other feed raw materials to ensure stable supply and regulate market order, avoiding increased pressure on breeding enterprises due to further cost increases.

Experts remind that the industry’s period of losses is also a period prone to outbreaks of diseases. Farmers often look for ways to save money during difficult times, whether it’s on preventive medications or feed, which may not be as meticulous as usual. However, once diseases are contracted, farmers can suffer severe losses. At the same time, it is essential to continuously strengthen monitoring and early warning, actively guide industry production and sales, ensure stable market supply, and promote healthy industry development.

It is understood that the state has begun to store frozen pork reserves and has guided various regions to simultaneously increase storage efforts to form a joint regulation force.

In the next step, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, the National Development and Reform Commission, and other departments will closely monitor the supply and demand situation and price trends in the live pig market, increase the release of early warning information, study the adjustment of the normal retention target for breeding sows nationwide, further release signals for capacity reduction, and simultaneously conduct production record management for large pig enterprises, continuously strengthen comprehensive regulation of pig production capacity, and timely carry out reserve adjustments to promote the stable operation of the live pig market.