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Prices of pork will increase by 20% effective Tuesday, September 20, 2022, the Pig Farmers Association of Ghana (PFAG) has announced.
The increase means that a live pig will be sold at the benchmark minimum farmgate price of GH₵18 per kilogramme (of the animal’s weight) while the carcass will be sold at GH₵28 per kilogramme.
According to the President of the PFAG, Kwame Appiah Danquah the increase in the price is a result of a hike in the prices of feed.
He said the current prices of GH₵15 and GH₵23 for the live weight and carcass respectively set in May 2022 had remained static in spite of the rise in the prices of feed and other farming inputs. He added that premium quality pigs/pork will sell for higher than the benchmark minimum farmgate prices.
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Speaking in a telephone interview with Graphic Online, Mr Danquah said the price increase would make up for price hikes in production inputs from the year 2021 to date.
“If you go to the farm and a pig is 100kilogrammes it means it would cost you 1,800cedis from next week,” he said.
“In May we did a price increase of 15 and 23 cedis and we have increased it by 20% which brings it to 18cedis for the live weight and 28cedis for the carcass”.
Reasons
He said the prices of feed such as wheat bran and soya had increased by over 100 per cent this year, forcing some PFAG members out of business.
“Wheat bran that we were buying at 16 cedis is now 46 cedis and soya which we were buying at 160 cedis is now 340 cedis, so this increase is not going to give us profit but rather it is going to keep us in business.
“You can’t say we are taking undue advantage of the customer because we are making losses and losing our businesses at this rate”.
Read the entire PFAG release below;
PIG FARMERS ASSOCIATION OF GHANA (PFAG) PRESS RELEASE 6/08/2022
Invited guest, fellow farmers, friends of the media, ladies and gentlemen. On behalf of the National leadership of the Pig Farmers Association of Ghana(PFAG), I want to thank you for making time to grace our Porktober 2022 media launch and media briefing this morning.
As stated by my colleague executives, the Pig Farmers Association of Ghana(PFAG) has gone through various transformation, post-Covid effects, ASF etc, in the midst of already challenging feed supply facing our industry.
The pig farming and processing industry has had several price hikes to our production inputs from last year 2020 to date.
This compelled leadership to review prices of our products effective May 2022.
Further increase in feed cost, husbandry cost etc, a further review is necessary to prevent farmers from shutting down their farms.
Below are highlights of a few;
- The price of maize (white &Yellow) which farmers used to buy at GH 56/bag has increased to GH 173-175/bag (More than 300% increase)
- The price of wheat brand stands at a whooping GH 46/bag as compared earlier price of GH16/bag to (About 287%).
- Soya, the Pig farmers key protein ingredient in feed formulation has moved from GH160/bag and now Ghc340, a whopping 213% jump.
- Our main feed base, Rice bran has also increased from GH 17/bag to GH 50/bag (more than 290%).
- Vet services and medication is not been spared of the increases, up-to 100% increase been experienced.
Several members who have not been able to cope with the ever increasing prices have shut down or offered their farms for sales/rent.These increases have pushed a lot of farmers out of business. From the middle of last year 2021 to date,leadership has been receiving calls from farmers who want to sell their piglets & gilts to enable them feed their pigs. Others have chosen to sell the whole farm.
In light of the above, the leadership in collaboration with the feed suppliers & bulk buyers have agreed to the below increases of the MINIMUM farm gates prices; LIVE WEIGHT=GH 18/kg CARCASS WEIGHT=GH 28/kg
This increase constitutes about 20% increase. These increases are effective 20th September 2022.
Once more, we appeal to our hard-working farmers & bulk buyers to accept the marginal increase as we grow our industry. We will advise our buyer who do supply to the malls not sign long term price contracts but to sign short term contact like three months because of the situation we are in at the moment.
PFAG leadership believes by keeping a low increase will encourage patronage of our pig/ pork products as we grow our industry.
Thank you and God bless the pig farming industry.
Kwame Appiah Danquah (president)
Source: Graphic