Livestock populations in England as of June 1, this year, have declined when compared to the same month last year, the June Survey of Agriculture has shown.
The results of the survey, which are estimates of cattle, sheep, pig and poultry populations on commercial agricultural holdings in England, were published by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) yesterday (Wednesday, August 31).
The pig population has seen the biggest decline. In 2022, the total number of pigs in England decreased by 3% to just over 4.1 million animals. Breeding pigs decreased by 18%, while fattening pigs fell by 1.4%.
The female breeding herd accounts for almost 80% of breeding pigs and fell by 17% to 261,000, which is, Defra said, the lowest it has been in the past 20 years.
The next-largest decrease was in the poultry population, which fell by 1.6% to 139 million in 2022.
Broiler numbers saw a small decrease of 0.5%, to just over 97 million and the breeding and laying flock fell by 2.6%, to almost 33 million.
The cattle and calf population fell by 0.7% from June 2021 figures to stand at 5.1 million animals in June 2022.
The breeding herd saw a decrease of 1.3% to stand at 1.7 million, but continues to account for just over a third of the overall total number of cattle in England.
The dairy herd fell by 0.7% while the beef herd fell by 2.2%.
The sheep population however, increased in the year compared with June 2021 by 2% to reach 14.9 million.
The female breeding flock increased by 2.9% to 7.1 million and lambs increased by 1.5% to 7.5 million.
