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Research/Policy Brief No 1.

The Analysis of Pork and Other Meat Demand andImplications for Pro-poor Livestock Policy and

Development Agenda in Vietnam 

Key points

Key point 1 –Pork is the dominant meat and consumer preference towardsfreshness provides a degree of natural protection towards import.Demand for pork and other meat would increase as income rise thoughconsumers tend to diversify their meat consumption towards seafood andpoultry.

Key point 2 – Open wet markets are prefered channels for daily meatshopping. These outlets are closely linked with pork supply chainsinvolving smallholders and the preference is thus in favor of theircontinued participation.

Key point 3 – Pig disease, chemical residuals and hygine conditions areincreasinly concerned by pork consumers. They often reduce or stop porkconsumption and shift to other alternatives or to perceivedly safer outletsin the presence of pig disease outbreak.

Key point 4 – Modern outlets of pork purchase are not necessarily safer inthe absence of good food safety surveilance system in Vietnam. Bio-risks

are low, however, thank to the adoption of risk-mitigating practices.Key point 5 – Increase demand for pork creates shortage in the supply of qualified breeding pigs: indigeneous and western gilts and boar semen,especially at small and medium scale farms. A niche market ermerges forsmallholder producers supplying indigenouse pigs.

Key point 6 – Market opportunities associated with growing demand andconsumer preferences are there for smallholder pig raisers to exploit toviably increase their income and embark on the transition to enlarged andcommercial farming. Empirical research to examine viable technological,institutional and policy options for enhancing competitiveness to facilitate

inclusion of smallholders in the fresh meat supply chain, which constitutesa component of the project, will be important contributions to inform thepolicy debate.

Introduction

Along with rapid economic growth and increasing affluence, Vietnamesedietary patterns are shifting from a predominantly starch-based diet toone with relatively high proportion of meat, fruits, and vegetables. Pork isthe dominant type of meat in Vietnamese cuisine and has consistentlyaccounted for a significantly high proportion of meat consumption. Thegrowing demand for pork and other meat undoubtedly provides an

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opportunity for domestic livestock production, which has experiencedsteady growth in the last decade. Challenges arise as to how currentproduction systems, of which the majority are household-based, evolve tomeet this increasing and more differentiated demand. In this context,smallholder pig farmers might encounter constraints in meeting

requirements by supply chains linking with modern outlets and servingmore affluent and demanding consumers. They also face with difficulty incompeting with larger domestic and foreign rivals and in the transition tolarge and more commercialized farms. Understanding the ongoing andpotential changes in consumer income and demand patterns and theirimplications in the year to come would be of paramount importance inguiding Vietnam’s pro-poor livestock policy and development agenda.

Box 1. Background on topic being addressedWith higher income and thus higher food expenditure, Vietnameseconsumers are no longer confined to diet with low proportion of animal-source protein. Increased affluence allows them to not only financegreater volume of meat purchase but also to be more demanding withrespect to meat quality and safety. Growing exposure to internationalcuisines and dining culture might also have important impact on meatconsumption, especially among young consumers.

Box 2. Data sources and methods

To investigate the pattern of demand for pork and other meat, data isobtained from a consumer survey of 1650 households in Hanoi, Ho ChiMinh city and six rural provinces: Ha Tay in the Red River Delta, Phu Thoin the Northern Uplands; Nghe An in the Northern Central, Daklak in theCentral Highlands, Dong Nai in the South East and Tien Giang in theMekong River Delta, selected so as to relatively represent thegeographical diversity in Vietnam. Seven types of meat are considered:fresh pork, other pork (frozen and processed), poultry (chicken and duck),eggs (chicken and duck), beef and carabeef, fish and seafood. A study of genotypes and breeding pig demand and supply was commissioned toAsvelis, a veterinary and livestock service agent.

Descriptive and empirical analyses are applied to unveil meatconsumption and shopping patterns, meat demand elasticity and thecondition of breeding pig market.

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Meet consumption pattern

Meat consumption has been increasing in the last ten years, dueprincipally to growing income. Almost all households in our surveypurchased pork, which accounts for around 40 percent of their meatexpenditure, followed by fish, poultry and beef. The proportion of pork isfairly invariant across expenditure quintiles in urban area. In rural area,pork share increases slightly when one moves from the poorest end tohigher income. Among attributes considered by consumers whenpurchasing pork and other meat, form, color, consistency and smell rankas most important determinants. Some key findings are:

Pork is the most popular type of meat and consumed widely by Vietnamese households.

Freshness is most preferred by Vietnamese consumers and fresh pork isthe dominant form of pork purchased. There is also a strong preferencetowards lean pork.

Black indigenous pigs are often perceived to give better taste and quality as, especially in the North though many consumers cannot distinguishpork of different breeds.

As income rises, pork demand will continue to increase considerably though consumers tend to diversify their meat composition towards more

seafood and poultry 

Market outlet choice

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Figure 1: Consumer preference in terms of 

lean/fat content

Figure 2: Meat composition projection with incremental

scenarios of meat expenditure

Figure 3: Most preferred market outlets by urban

consumers (percentage of HHs)

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The choice of market outlets is found to be conditioned by factors that arerelated to consumers’ mobility and level of affluence, time budgets,concerns about food safety and hygiene, proximity to market outlets, andgeographical location which captures the effects of income differences,traditional marketing practices, and prevailing market infrastructure.

• Despite the expansion of modern retail outlets in big cities,traditional outlets ranging from temporary neighborhood stalls topermanent open structures are still shopping channels for fresh porkof the vast majority of urban consumers.

• There is an apparent trend towards use of modern retail outlets bythose who are younger and more affluent and opted to live fartheraway from the city centers.

 

Food safety

Consumers are increasinglyconcerned about food safety. Pigdisease, chemical residuals andhygiene conditions rank as mostworrying issues. In the advent of disease outbreak, responses rangefrom stopping or reducing porkconsumption, substituting pork byother alternatives or shift porkshopping outlets to perceivably safer

ones. Only a fraction of pork buyersdo not change their behavior.

The perceived faith in supermarket asa safer food outlet might be misgrounded, however, in the context of developing countries with poor food safety surveillance like Vietnam. Ourrisk assessment exercise in late 2009 shows that bio-hazards, measuredby typical bacterial counts, in supermarkets are significantly higher thanin traditional wet markets in peri-urban Hanoi. Nevertheless, bio-riskswere found pretty low, possibly due to consumers’ adoption of risk-mitigating practices such as short interval between purchasing and

cooking meat.

Indigenous pigs

Increasing pork consumption bringsabout growing demand for pigletsand as a result demand forreplacement gilts and boar (semen).Attempts to disseminate high-yielding improved breeds have been

made by Vietnamese governmentthrough development programs but

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Figure 4: Proportion of pork samples with

unacceptable levels of bio-hazards (%)

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adoption rate and productivity gain have not yet been as expected. Thereare still shortage in the distribution of particular types of gilts and boarsemen in different areas:

• Insufficiency of indigenous gilts and western boar semen in northern

and central remote regions and of western gilts in some other areas.• Insanitary and uncontrolled quality of breeding pigs

The lack of indigenous gilts and consumer preference for indigenous pigsprovide a niche market for smallholder indigenous pig suppliers.

Conclusions

The following primary conclusions can be drawn from this study of porkand other meat demand, which are critical for pro-poor livestock policyand for pig farmers, especially smallholders:

There is increasing demand for pork and other meat, which smallholderpig keepers can potentially exploit to their advantages, thank to consumerpreference for fresh meat and traditional outlets, through supply chainslinked with temporary and permanent open markets.

Quality and safety of pork and other meat are growingly concerned byconsumers and their responses range from reducing consumption toshifting to perceivedly safer outlets: modern shopping channels. Due tothe lack of a good surveilance system, bio-risks within these channels arenot necessarily less, however.

Shortages of breeding pigs, including both indigeneous and western giltsand boar semen in different regions as a result of demand growth areboth constraints and opportunities who can make use of this niche marketby supplying indegenous (and probably cross-bred) gilts.

Implications for policy and interventions

Pork and other meat demand pattern has important implications tofarmers themselves and to pro-poor livestock development policies inVietnam:

• Growing demand for pork and other meat provides opportunities tosmallholder pig farmers to earn income and expand their productionscale. The question is which viable options are accessible and to beuptaken by farmers so as to enhance their competitiveness to makeuse of these opportunities. Appropriate technological, institutionaland policy interventions must be considered.

• A niche market for indigenous replacement gilts and indigenous pigsis there for smallholder pig raisers to exploit, given the shortage inbreeding pigs in various areas. Policies and institutions to preserveindigenous genotypes and supply qualified indigenous breeding pigs

are necessary to support.

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• In the near future at least, consumer preferences for freshness andtraditional meat shopping outlets still facilitate smallholder inclusionin pork supply chains. Since pig disease and food safety isincreasingly concerned and as food safety surveillance in modernoutlets are strengthened, smallholder participation would be

hampered unless better management practice is applied.

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