CHINA: By 2020 China will account for one-third of the world's meat consumption while India will consume 20 per cent of milk production, an international conference in Dublin heard yesterday.
Christopher Delgado, of the International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington, predicted a dramatic increase in milk and meat production in the next 15 years, when addressing the International Grassland Conference in UCD being attended by 1,500 scientists.
The world food expert said the "explosion" in consumption in the developing world would lead to a livestock revolution.
"By 2020, annual demand for meat in the developing countries will be over 70 million tonnes higher than today and annual demand for milk will be more than 150 million tonnes higher," he said. "While the growth in consumption will be spread throughout the developed world, China, India and Brazil, because of their size, will continue to increase their dominance of world food markets for livestock products."
He predicted an additional 60 million steers will be required by 2020 to meet the increased demand in developing countries.
However, countries like Ireland might not benefit greatly from the growth in developing countries' consumer demand as those countries would be increasing their outputs.
But developing countries would continue to be huge importers of cereals for animal feed, with a net import requirement of 200 million tonnes per annum by 2020.
In developed countries annual per capita meat consumption would be 87kg, compared with 36kg in developing countries.