FMD in Germany Does Not Necessarily Translate to US Opportunity

Lorrie Boyer
Reporter
“On January 10, Germany notified that they had found Foot and Mouth Disease in a small sort of exotic herd of water buffalo just outside Berlin. Investigations ongoing.”
As Borrer explains, three of the main export markets for German pork present challenges for any market share gains for us pork, of those is the United Kingdom.
“US exports to UK are minimal. This is an area where we've been saying, there should be great opportunity if we could have some type of reciprocal market access. But today, the combination of tariffs and quotas. And then on top of that, the SPS issues are exports to UK are limited, highly limited. And then we get into Vietnam. Us share into Vietnam is also minimal, partially because we have the Tarik disadvantage and then Korea. But that is mostly single rib bellies, product that the US exports, but really just small volume,”
With the belly prices from the US, generally higher than that from Germany.