Economic effects of African swine fever at Hungarian and European level

Abstract

Examining the pig sector in Europe, it can be said that the emergence of African swine fever (ASF) has a major impact on the sector. In connection with this, the aim of this article was to highlight the trends of the Hungarian pig sector, as well as the sales prices of Germany for a more accurate analysis, to give a comprehensive picture of how the Hungarian market trends developed with the appearance of ASF. For this, a three-year cycle was analyzed using different timeline analysis methods. After evaluating this, it was confirmed that compared to the period before the outbreak of the epidemic in Hungary, market fluctuations increased, and in the trends of weekly sales prices per kilogram, the predictability decreased. Based on this, it can be concluded that in such a globalized and price-tracking sector, it is a serious lesson for Hungary that due to its small size and low degree of integration, it is much more disadvantaged during crisis situations than other larger pig-keeping countries. All participants in the sector need to learn from this situation and, together with the policy, change the situation in Hungary as soon as possible, by raising the vertical integration of the sector.