ABSTRACT
The positioning of this chapter next to the one entitled ‘Cheap as Chicken’ is deliberate. There are many similarities between the production of pigs and broiler chickens for meat. First, the scale of these production industries has grown enormously since the Second World War. FAO statistics
calculate that the global number of pigs rose from 400 million in 1961 to 900 million in 2007 (FAOSTAT, 2009). China dwarfs the rest of the world in having approximately 500 million pigs compared to, for example, 150 million pigs in the entire enlarged EU. This is matched of course with consumption patterns and pig meat continues to grow as a highly popular form of animal protein.
