US. hog producers pump billions of dollars into the American economy, according to a new economic contribution report released by the National Pork Producers Council. NPPC economist Holly Cook says they looked at 2023 levels of hog production, modeling the ripple effect into this year.

“This is a report that captures the pork industry’s total economic importance in terms of the jobs that are supported, the personal incomes that we’re helping generate, and just overall, the value that we’re adding to the US economy.”

With hog producers supporting more than 573,000 total jobs, generating $37 billion in personal income and adding $62 billion to US GDP. Cook says in conversations with policymakers and other industry stakeholders, this information demonstrates the importance of the hog industry.

“Which essentially quantifies what would be lost if pork production wasn’t there, or if we are to continue to see a trend towards fewer hog farms, or last year was a really difficult year for the pork industry. Really just helps underscore the importance of our issues and why others should care about those.”

Pointing to last year, Cook notes she comes from the number one pork producing state in the nation, Iowa, and because of her experience on the family farm, she wanted to know the impact those difficulties have looking forward.

“2023 was extremely difficult for pork producers. We had their input costs and lower hog revenues last year, which led to losses across our industry. And so when we were gearing up to do this report using 2023 as our production year, I was curious to see what those results were going to look like.”

Especially with fewer dollars available in the industry to make purchases or generate activity.

“And so we did see those impacts come down from the last time we did this report, which used 2021 production data, which was a very high revenue year. But even with all of those challenges, we do still see the industry being a very significant contributor economically at the US, state and local level.”