Will there be salo and meat deficit in Ukraine?

Meat sellers complain about the endangered villages, but experts are optimistic. Does Ukraine have a deficit of salo and meat? To understand whether Ukrainians are experiencing a lack of pork, the correspondents went to the market.

Some sellers assure that problems with deliveries are not observed, the main thing is that there must be demand.

"Animals are reared in home conditions and then are delivered to us. I would not say that there are problems with pork," the saleswoman Svitlana said. However, not all of her colleagues share same optimism. For example, the saleswoman Larisa Nikulina complains that the villages, where she orders carcasses, are gradually dying out. Therefore, she has to spend a lot of time to find pork.

But there will be no deficit of meat in Ukraine, the chairman of the Association of Suppliers of Trade Networks, Oleksii Doroshenko, reassured. "We have two trends at the same time: the first is the reduction [of pork production], but at the same time, the second is the revival of powerful enterprises with new technologies." In a year or two, we will see an increase in production," Oleksii Doroshenko said. In addition, Ukraine imports pork from Europe, in particular, Germany and Poland. Therefore, exports cover all needs.

According to the State Statistics Service, the number of cattle in Ukraine in 2017 was 3.63 million heads, which is 1.5% less than in 2016. The number of pigs decreased by 8.2%, to 6.12 million heads. The number of sheep and goats increased by 0.1%, to 1.32 million heads, poultry - by 1.7%, to 205.1 million heads. Since early 2018, there has also been a reduction in the number of pigs - by 6.3%.