Tianjin offers subsidies to help meat demand

To support the breeding and cultivating of pigs, North China's Tianjin municipality announced the offering of up to 1,000 yuan ($142.7) subsidies to new boars introduced to local pig farms.

The new subsidies were launched late last week, and will be available until the end of this year.

Tianjin also announced an increase in the numbers of local gilts, encourage more companies to construct pig breeding and cultivating centers in a bid to help more meat hit the local markets.

In addition, the government announced the lowering of approval thresholds for the construction of new pig farms.

It will remove the previous limit stating that pig farms should not be more than 1 hectare, but they remain required to abide by stringent ecological and environment protection standards.

Currently, the average price for a mature pig is between 5,000-7,000 yuan, according to Tianjin Daily.

The subsidy and expansion of pig farms are expected to quench the market thirst for meat - though as healthier, lighter meal choices gain popularity, choosing to eat less meat, or even going vegetarian, may be more important in gradually reducing the market demand for meat overall.

Aside from Tianjin, around 20 provinces and cities in China have announced their measures to stabilize the prize of meat to date.

According to National Business Daily, the total subsidy from 20 provinces and cities to help stabilize the price hit 5.5 billion yuan.

From Nov 1 to 7, the average meat price dropped to 51.36 yuan, lower than 1.2 yuan from the previous week, according to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs.

It marked the first time that the price of meat saw a week-on-week drop this year.