The Netherlands is doing well with meat exports: pigs ‘bacon copper’ | Financial

The Netherlands exported 8.8 billion euros worth of meat last year. The majority of this is produced or processed here. In 15 percent of the cases, it concerns meat from another country that has been traded. After the Netherlands, Spain, Germany, Poland and Denmark are major meat exporters in Europe.

Trade abroad

The meat industry contributes more and more to the economy by selling their products at home and abroad. In 2019, the sector contributed 8.7 billion euros to the economy. In 2015 that was still 7 billion euros. Exports are playing an increasingly important role in this. About two thirds of what is earned in the Netherlands from meat comes from trade with foreign countries, especially Germany, the United Kingdom and China.

In order to export such quantities of meat, the sector also imports a lot. This concerns, for example, live animals, meat still to be processed or raw materials for animal feed. In 2019, for example, the Netherlands imported 240 million euros worth of poultry, mainly from Germany.

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