Claude Wilson, Freelance Writer
Pork processing
JAMAICA'S PORK industry is well overdue for redevelopment, but its future rests firmly in the hands of the industry stakeholders and the Ministry of Agriculture to guide the proposed developmental plans and strategies.
The scope and shape of the future development of the local pig/pork industry was summarised in a Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) document submitted to the Agriculture Ministry.
The development plan from the Ministry of Agriculture proposes to bring the estimated $6 billion industry in line with or near first-rate production levels and practises for greater efficiency and profitability. Specifically, it seeks to focus on herd efficiency and development, to arrest the cyclic gluts through production control, and bring higher level, standard management and specialisation to the industry.
Even as the industry accounts for less than one per cent of Jamaica's Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) estimates that the pig production provides direct employment to 6,200 persons representing 3.1 per cent of the total agricultural labour force.
Based on their analysis of the pig industry, the plan calls for a more pragmatic relationship between stakeholders, that is, growers, processors, and inter-dependent actors within the pork commodity chain, to bring method to the industry.
ORGANISE PRODUCTION
This will include an attempt to organise primary production, processing and marketing activities into a systems relationship within the commodity chain.
The call is for a restructured, more regulated industry that will increase productivity and competitiveness increasing the economic well being of the rural farm families, as a means to poverty alleviation.
It recommends a stepwise development of the industry in adapting the following necessary strategies.
The registration of growers, it says, will not only bring order to the industry, but will also address what the IICA report calls "the exit and re-entry by small producers" that is a primary factor in the pernicious cyclic glut/shortage of the industry.
An important area to be
tackled is the rationalisation of the sow herd population that includes the rigid culling of the high percentage of unproductive sows with a corresponding selection of productive gilt stock.
The 2003 Data Bank and Evaluation survey found a sow population slightly over 18,000 females producing an estimated average of 6.7 million kilogrammes of fresh pork per year. But, under vastly improved management the plan says 10,400 sows with 4,500 replacement gilts could satisfy the current annual consumption pattern of 10 million kilogrammes of pork.
The recommendation to introduce specialisation of growers into breeders, multiplier and finishers operations will also facilitate efficiency in production and help to minimise glut.
Production of quality pig meat should benefit from a proposed carcass grading system that financially reward farmers who produce pork of higher meat quality.
Synonymous with a grading system is the recommendation to build new abattoirs and meat processing facilities that meet international standard while upgrading existing slaughtering facilities islandwide.
VALUE-ADDED PROCESSING
Local fresh pork production contributes an average 1.5 million kg or 42 per cent of the 3.5 million kg of cuts and pork bellies required for value-added processing for both domestic and export market. According to the IICA finding, capital investment among processors is in the region of US$10-15 million even as they currently utilise half of their plant capacity.
Imports of pork leg, butts and shoulders, loin, ribs and bellies increased from 181,930 kg in 1996 to 691,306 kg in 2000, moving from US$330,304 to US$1,592,173 in 2000.
Other areas to be addressed include the threats and opportunities for the industry, the introduction of a contract system of inputs and output.
With the demand for breakfast meat, bacon, sausage, and ham, set to increase with the expansion of the tourist industry, the need to 'beef up' pork production should not be delayed, according to sources in the agri-business sector.
Industry planners are certain that a standardised, vastly improved and regulated pig production system will see astronomical increase to the value of the industry; will contribute to increase income generation at all levels and scale; will bring the country nearer to self-sufficiency, saving foreign exchange and adding to the nation's food security.
However, the farmers have stated that it is incumbent on local pig growers and processors to " safeguard the future prospect for growth in their business by seeking strategic alliances with local power base entities." They warn that Jamaica's pig producers "will have their histories written for them if they do not write it themselves."
PROJECTED DEVELOPMENT
The projected development in Jamaica is predicated on the fact that the estimated $5.5 billion industry is grossly under-producing, uncompetitive and underdeveloped in best production
practices. But expansion does make sense in an industry that encompasses a network of interdependent stakeholders of various sizes, concern, scope of influence and expectation.
According to Data Bank findings, the Jamaican pig industry, with its impeding constraints, continues to maintain a 10-year average meat production of 6.69 million kg buttressed by average annual imports of 2.0 million. The main user of the imports is agro-processing, which accounts for 60 per cent of its utilisation.
Market analysis shows an aggregate local sales estimated at J$60 million per annum while no figure could be attained of the US$ value of export to other Caribbean market. However, Trinidad and Tobago earns just under US$592,000 within CARICOM, according to a CSO Trade Report of 2000, and Barbados, in corresponding year, netted US$321,900 from their primary markets, Jamaica and St. Lucia.
Comparing production cost per kilo of fresh pork we see Jamaica, with its high feed input cost, at US$2.10, Barbados producing at US$3.00 and T&T, where the largest producers mill their own feed, producing at US$1.71.
Latest figures from the U.S. and Canada shows production cost of US$0.66 and US$0.96 respectively.
Competitive analysis done on the industries of the three leading states indicates that generally processed pork continues to be uncompetitive when compare to there imported Canadian counterpart products.
For example, the Nominal Protection Coefficient (NPC) gives a marginal edge (1.00) to Jamaican Streaky Bacon but deemed it uncompetitive in Sliced Ham (1.37) and Salami (1.38). The high cost of production in Barbados should logically reduce the competitiveness of its processed pork. T&T is near neutral (NPC=1) in Shoulder Ham (1.02), has marginal edge in Leg Ham (1.06) but, unlike Jamaica, is in a pickle with its Streaky Bacon (1.87).
Import competitiveness addresses the ability of the domestically produced items to compete against imports from a particular point of origin. The NPC can be used also to estimate the impact of government policy on the particular item.
In as much as there is adherents to general standards in the pig industries, the region lacks an organised system of carcass grading and does not have an establish standard for pork, which would have adding market value to its products.
Barbados and Trinidad has surged ahead in quality control and in adopting Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) that also have value added benefits and would ensure that food safety becomes a key aspect of production.
If it is to modernised, become self-sufficient and compete favourably, CARICOM producers, and its Agriculture Ministries, must, according to recent findings, improve management skills and training, improve technology, address the feed management and cost, address waste disposal, and improve bio-security.
In Jamaica, the pig industry contribution to the employment of over 6,200 individuals or is 3 per cent of the agriculture workforce. Direct employment in Barbados is estimated at 300-350 jobs of just over 5,000 in the individuals employed in agriculture. In T&T the industry provides direct and indirect employment to an estimated 4741 persons.
