Belgian poultry production at a new record
In Belgium, 314.9 million chickens were slaughtered last year. That was 1.7% more year-over-year and a record number since records began in 2008, the national statistics bureau Statbel reports.
Among livestock categories, poultry showed the strongest growth while the slaughter figures for cattle were down 7.3% and pigs showed a meagre increase of just 0.3%.
Chickens – a third of national meat production
The chicken sector produced 543 million kgs of meat, which represented just under a third of the national meat production in the country. The pig industry remains the largest meat producer, supplying 55% or 951 million kgs of national production. That share is declining in favour of poultry.
Earlier figures from Statbel show that in 2024, Belgium had some 1,700 poultry farms, holding 38.5 million broiler chickens, just under 9 million laying hens, 4.6 million pullets and 2.78 million breeding hens. The total number of poultry was 55.6 million, a near doubling in 20 years. Almost all of those chickens and other poultry are located in the Flanders part of the country.
The threat of avian influenza
As in other European countries, Belgian poultry holders endured some large outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza in the last few months. Most cases centered around Veurne near the west coast and Roeselare further to the east. Belgium’s Federal Agency for the Safety of the Food Chain (FASFC) registered a total of 20 cases, the last one on 26 January.
“The economic impact – both for the poultry holders and for the country as a whole – is enormous,” sector organisation Landsbond Pluimvee said. Recently, FASFC could cancel all regional protection zones, although confinement of all poultry is still compulsory in the whole of Belgium.
