Pork stockpiles in the U.S. dropped 11.2 percent at the end of March from a year earlier, the government said.
Warehouses held 575.223 million pounds of pork, down from 647.784 million on March 31, 2013, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said today in a report. Inventories declined 12.1 percent from the end of February.
As of March 31, stockpiles of pork bellies, which are cured and sliced to make bacon, jumped 54.9 percent from a year earlier to 79.721 million pounds, according to today’s report. Warehouse supplies of ham declined 5.2 percent from a year earlier to 89.6 million pounds.
Chicken-meat inventories at the end of March were 6.4 percent smaller than a year earlier at 588.173 million pounds, the USDA said. Beef supplies fell 20.8 percent from a year earlier to 404.754 million pounds as of March 31, the report showed.
