USA Market, June 2018 

As I wrote a couple months ago the pork industry is in the cross hairs of the political show down. Mexico, China, and Canada are all threatening to put tariffs on pork exports from the U.S. in response to the steel and aluminum tariffs President Trump has ordered.  

Mexico and China combined with Hong Kong and Japan are large importers of our pork. The U.S. exports 1 of every 4 pigs raised,  however every country eats a different cut of those pigs.

  • hams to Mexico,
  • a variety meats to China and
  • Japan loves loins that have color and marbling.

I have stated before that even with the extra packing capacity we still have to sell the meat. Exports are going to have to get us through this and we cannot stand a long term dispute with our trading partners. In the long term I think this will all get resolved but that does not mean we won’t be feeling the brunt of this battle in the short term.

On a lighter note, the corn crop rating was the highest ever last week. We have had 5 record crops in a row and that has left us with a carryover that should keep grain prices and our feed cost under control.

Hog futures are a little higher today and I think they have over done the negative tariff issue and realize that it will get resolved and hog markets will move higher.

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This post was written by Genesus