“Short-sighted” policies by major supermarkets could trigger a pork shortage, a pig breeder has warned.
Matthew Curtis, managing director of Yorkshire-based pig-breeding company ACMC Ltd, said many were relying on cheap imported pork from pigs reared using sow stalls and systems already outlawed here and soon to go in the EU.
British pig farmers are currently losing 16 pence per kg — about �13 per pig — on every animal they produce, because some British supermarkets don’t pay a realistic rate for their pigmeat, he claimed. He praised Morrisons, which is paying higher prices to farmers for pork, and had seen a 39% increase in pork sales as consumers increasingly turned to it as a cheaper alternative to beef and lamb.
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