HCMCity (VNS/VNA) - The imported pork and declining meat consumption havepushed pork prices down, helping stabilise the consumer price index.

Thismonth pork has been sold at the Hoc Mon wholesale market in Ho ChiMinh City for around 72,000 VND (3.17 USD) per kilogramme, 8,000 VND down fromprevious months, according to its management.

LeXuan Huy, deputy general director of the CP Livestock Joint StockCompany, said hog prices are down because of increased imports of both frozenpork and live pigs as well as lower demand.

Accordingto the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, in the first seven monthsof this year Vietnam imported more than 93,248 tonnes of pork, mainly fromCanada, Germany, Poland, Brazil, the US, Spain, and Russia, 223 percent up fromthe same period in 2019.

Theministry licensed imports of pigs on the hoof from Thailand from mid-June. Asof August 36 companies registered to quarantine more than 4.7 million pigsarriving from Thailand into Vietnam, and over 75,000 of them havebeen slaughtered so far.

DeputyMinister of Agriculture and Rural Development Phung Duc Tien said Vietnam hasnot set a quota for imports of live pigs or meat and the Department of AnimalHealth always facilitates customs clearance of imports.

Butimporting pork has been difficult since African swine fever reduced the globalpig population by 12 percent.

NguyenKim Doan, vice chairman of the Dong Nai Livestock Association, said live hogprices in the south has been around 70,000 VND per kilogramme over the pastweek, and sometimes even lower while the production cost at present is 71,000VND.

Anotherreason for hog prices to fall was the advent of the seventh lunar month, knownas Vu Lan month, on August 19, a time when many families donot eat meat for religious reasons.

“Thereturn of COVID-19 also caused the price of pigs to fall as demand decreased.”

NguyenVan Trong, director of the ministry’s department of livestock production, saidas of the end of July the country had some 25.2 million pigs, 81.9 percent ofthe number before African swine fever first hit in January 2019./.