Germany: Meat production increased by 1.4 percent in 2024
This means that domestic meat production increased again for the first time since 2016 (8.4 million tonnes) after seven consecutive declines. In total, 48.7 million pigs, cattle, sheep, goats and horses and 693.3 million chickens, turkeys and ducks were slaughtered in slaughterhouses in 2024.
Pork: Slaughter volume increased by 1.9%
With 44.6 million animals slaughtered in 2024, the number of pigs slaughtered increased by 1.2% or 531,300 animals compared to the previous year. The number of pigs of domestic origin slaughtered increased by 1.6% to 43.3 million animals. The number of imported pigs slaughtered in German farms, on the other hand, fell by 9.2% to 1.3 million animals.
In total, German slaughterhouses produced around 4.3 million tonnes of pork in 2024. This was 1.9% or 80,500 tonnes more than in 2023, but 1.3 million tonnes less than in the record year of 2016, which corresponds to a decrease of almost a quarter (-24.9%).
Beef: Slaughter volume increased by 1.2%
The number of cattle slaughtered commercially in 2024 remained almost unchanged from the previous year, with an increase of 0.1% to 3.0 million animals. However, the slaughter volume increased by 1.2% to 1.0 million tonnes of beef, with average slaughter weights increasing in all cattle categories.
Poultry meat: Slaughter volume increased by 0.3%
The amount of poultry meat produced increased by 0.3% to 1.6 million tonnes in 2024 compared to 2023. The reason for the increase was solely the 1.8% increase in the production of young broiler meat to 1.1 million tonnes. The production of turkey meat, on the other hand, fell by 2.1% to 408,100 tonnes. In total, around 653.8 million chickens were slaughtered in the farms in 2024, of which 626.7 million were young broiler chickens and 27.1 million were soup chickens. In addition, there were 30.2 million turkeys and 9.3 million ducks.
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