Livestock Production in Ukraine

I promised Rob-Bear some data on when the last cow in Ukraine would turn out the light or why we eat chicken all the time.

Under the old Soviet production system cattle (dual purpose dairy/beef) production had to be heavily subsidized as it was horribly inefficient. Just one example was the number of people "employed" - 10 times or more per unit of inventory that one would expect. This production methodology carried over on the restructured state and collective farms creating huge losses so the cattle are dumped in favour of grain and oilseed production which is profitable. Only the new larger commercial dairy farms which import their management from Europe and America are profitable.

Pig production was much the same picture in Soviet times. The restructured farms stopped raising pigs because they lost too much money. A few years ago investors began building large commercial pig farms using western technology and management. Backyard pigs and big barns now account for the bulk of production. You can see the hog cycle beginning to appear about 10 years ago. The cure for low prices is low prices. The cure for high prices is high prices.

Poultry production has taken off and is extremely profitable and chicken meat is extremely cheap, about 1/3 to 1/4 the price of pork and beef. Virtually all broiler meat now comes from modern commercial companies, using western technology.