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. In 2000, Germany had a total of 141,450 holdings with pigs according to the Eurostat Farm Structure Survey. By 2007 this total had fallen by almost half to 79,420 and in 2008 dropped further to an estimated 66,000 holdings. Despite the large drop in the number of pig farms, Germany's national pig herd actually rose slightly over the period climbing 3.2% from 2000 to 2008 to reach 26.60mn head. This obviously points to rapid consolidation.
In 2009, we expect the trend towards bigger average farm size to have picked up pace as the tough economic conditions saw more smaller producers leave the industry. The rise in pork production over the past couple of years was driven in large part by liquidation of herds as farmers went out of business - in 2008, Germany's national pig herd fell 1.5% y-o-y and in 2009 fell again by 0.4%. We expect this to see pork production fall in 2010. Over our forecast period, we expect the number of pigs on German farms to start to climb once again as the economy improves. This underpins our forecast for a 12.7% increase in pork production over our forecast period to 2014.
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