Mid-term prospects of the beef, veal, milk and sheep sector in Hungary

Vőneki, Éva – Papp, Gergely

Keywords: beef, milk, sheep, market, prospects

The prospects for animal husbandry sectors are not encouraging, due to permanently high fodder prices and the vertically less organised, weak links between various stages of the produce path, which can be traced back to the disorganisation of the most important markets. Hungarian livestock farmers are unable to substantially influence the processes taking place on either the global or the EU markets and must, therefore, adapt by covering niche markets.
According to our various models, by 2013 the cattle population could reach
680-731 thousand units and the dairy cow population 266-269 thousand units. Growth can still primarily be expected in meat stock. In 2010, milk production should fulfil the national quota. Among milk and dairy products the share of liquid milk will rise, while in terms of imports growth can be expected in both processed products and liquid milk. Direct support for sheep farmers will remain partly linked to production and the number of ewes is unlikely to change notably, reaching about 1.1 million.
Based on all of the above, the output of Hungarian animal husbandry is not expected to increase significantly. Purchase prices will be high due to stable demand, but because of increased production costs actual income will hardly change.

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