Cattle futures jumped to a record and hog prices rose on speculation that demand for U.S. meat exports will increase as South Korea culls herds to combat the nation’s worst outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease.
South Korea has destroyed almost 2 million pigs and cattle, or about 16 percent of the herds and the biggest cull in its history, since the outbreak was reported in November. In 2009, the Asian nation was the fifth-largest buyer of U.S. beef and veal and the sixth-largest consumer of U.S. pork.
“The movement of animals is completely paralyzed,” said Dennis Smith, a senior account executive at Archer Financial Services Inc. in Chicago. “They basically are not producing any meat for their retail counters. They’re going to have to come to other people, primarily us.”
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