Düsseldorf (dpa / lnw) - North Rhine-Westphalia's Agriculture Minister Silke Gorißen (CDU) is very concerned about the significant decline in pig farming. In the past two years, between November 2020 and November 2022, the number of pig farms per year in Germany fell by an average of 9 percent and in North Rhine-Westphalia by as much as 11.7 percent, she said on Thursday in Düsseldorf. This is a significant acceleration of structural change.
Many farmers asked themselves whether further investments were really worthwhile, they lacked the prospects. Young farmers in particular urgently need planning security.
About a third of pork consumption is already covered by imports. If farms continue to die, more meat would have to be imported, said the minister. The demand for pork has decreased because eating habits are changing and more and more vegetarian and vegan products are being consumed. However, there will still be large parts of the population who also want to eat meat. It is about food security, short transport routes, jobs and also about being able to control the conditions under which animals are kept, the minister explained.
The CDU politician criticized the animal husbandry labeling law planned by Federal Minister of Agriculture Cem Özdemir (Greens) as incomplete and the funding as insufficient. "The set of rules currently presented by the federal government is so incomplete that it chokes off agricultural animal husbandry. We want to prevent that," explained Gorißen. "There must be no dismantling, but a conversion must take place and that is the order of the day."
In principle, support programs should be open to all companies, and large and small animal husbandries should not be played off against each other. There is a broad social consensus that livestock farming should be reorganized, and farmers do not question that either.
