Significant Growth of Livestock Productions in Latin America – Livestock businesses in Latin America have significant growth in the last two decades. Even, growth rate achieved by the country is greater compared to the ones achieved by United States and most of countries in the world. The significant development in livestock industries is surely something great for the countries in Latin America. From the growth, it has direct impact on general economic conditions in the area. Then, it can solve some nutritional deficiencies and even bring the food security to next level. Thus, it is interesting to know the growth and other interesting facts about the livestock industries and business in Latin America.
Related to the significant growth, there are some sectors that have great numbers that should get attention. In the last two decades, the highest growth can be seen in the production of poultry. Even, its growth reaches 112.2%. Then, on the second place is pork production that increases up to 64.3% in whole Latin America. The next two places are mil and beef production around 30% in each of them. This makes the growth affects Latin American countries and even the whole world. So far, it is said that quarter of the livestock products are supplied by the Latin America. This becomes interesting facts because in term of population, Latin America only has around 8% of the whole population of the world. That is why exports can really happen and it supports the economy of the countries in Latin America. In details, Latin America provides one-fourth supplies of beef in the world and 24% supplies of world’s poultry. As for milks and pork, it is around 10% in the whole world. With these data, it can be said that Latin America has significant roles in providing the whole worlds with sources of protein.
There are some reasons of these exceptional growths in Latin America. One of them is adoption of new technologies of productions and it is supported by the innovation in its practices. The inventory management is also great so it is possible to maintain good growth for the last two decades. As for top three producing countries in Latin America, there are Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico. These three countries can cover from 60% up to 85% of the whole productions in Latin America. Even in the meat production, 705 of them are from these three countries. It cannot be separated from the facts that these three countries have large area in Latin America when the areas are combined. In this case, Brazil is the one with largest beef production. Based on the data so far, it covers up to 52% of the whole production in Latin America. Even, its production has great growth around 2000 to 2018 where it has grown up to 45%. There are some reasons that make it happen. Government financial supports have significant impacts so private enterprises can emerge and gain development. Genetic improvement, grassland expansion and management, and also the maintained price of cattle are the other reasons. In addition to beef, Brazil also becomes leading country in term of production in poultry, pork, milk, and also the sheep meat. All of them are already above 40%.
As for the second place, it is Argentina in term of beef production. However, its number cannot be compared to what Brazil has achieved. Argentina can only reach 16% of beef production in Latin America. Meanwhile, Mexico can have better production rate in sheep meat, poultry, milk, and pork. While Latin America can gain great growth in livestock products, area of Central America got troubles in the last decades. One of them was caused by drought in 2018. It is known as Dry Corridor and it hit the area of Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, and even Nicaragua. The central areas did not have time even to recover from the severe drought that occurred in 2014. Just four years after it, the Dry Corridor hit them and there is also El Nino. These made the livestock producers in Central America to stop and even abandon their business.
Regardless significant growth in productions, it is interesting to see the data of export trends in Latin America. In 2018, the countries only exported around 7% of their total productions. It started to change when some large importing countries experienced the economic growth. Because of that, export rates increase in Latin America. It gets even better because of the price management that makes the importing countries attracted to imports more meets and livestock products. In this case, Brazil and Argentina may seem compete with United States in term of exports. However, these two countries cannot deny the fact United States also become potential markets for their livestock products. Even if there are massive growths, some challenges emerge in these countries of Latin America. One of them is the infrastructure that will need to get concern so the livestock system can be managed more properly in the near future.