After hitting a record $2.6 billion of U.S. pork to Mexico in 2024, demand continues to grow in 2025, expanding 11% in the first quarter.
Overall pork consumption has grown more than 50% over the past 15 years, according to U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) Mexico Director Gerardo Rodriguez and is due to several reasons.
“No. 1 is the confidence that people have on the product,” he says. “No. 2 is the amount of exposure that people are seeing the product nowadays.”
Rodriguez points out when the Free Trade Agreement in the mid-90s started, pork was perceived only as an ingredient to do further processing. Now pork can be seen in retail, food service, high-end restaurants and convenience stores.
“The fact that you are able to see pork in all the different channels is easier for us to keep expanding the consumption per capita,” he adds.
Greater pork demand has also attracted new competition in the market with all eligible suppliers having zero-duty access. This makes preserving the duty-free status of U.S. pork important. More than 50% of the total amount of pork is being imported, which means international markets are important to Mexico, cites Rodriguez. The U.S. has 85% of that market share.
“That means the relationship between Mexico and the United States regarding pork is very, very important,” Rodriguez says. “We don’t want to have any retaliation or anything like that, because at the end of the day, nobody wins and everything lose wealth and value, and that is where we’re trying to keep open as much as possible.”
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