Pigs

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The supermarket is offering pork producers the opportunity to align all pigs supplied to Sainsbury’s to a fixed price from 13 March to 5 June.

Sainsbury’s has announced a £2.8m support payment for its pork farmers that guarantees the price they are paid for a 12-week period from 13 March to 5 June.

The supermarket is offering the payment to the 87% of its pork producers that are members of its pork development group for the period.

The development group was launched by Sainsbury’s in 2020 in a bid to pay prioducers above the market price and help provide resilience and security by reducing market volatility. It has so far led to an additional investment of £5m in its pork supply chain by the retailer.

“At Sainsbury’s we really value the relationships we have with our suppliers and believe that through support and collaboration we can uphold flexible, transparent supply chains that are able to navigate instability,” said Gavin Hodgson, Sainsbury’s head of agriculture, aquaculture and horticulture.

It comes amid an ongoing backlog of thousands of pigs, which has crippled the pork sector over the past year, and follows calls by the pig sector for greater support from retailers. 

Referring to this crisis and cost challenges, Hodgson claimed the supermarket had introduced the investment to “provide our producers with security whilst maintaining high levels of animal health and welfare as well as product quality and great value for our customers”.

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