Meat demand in China

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to provide a thorough analysis of meat demand in China and predict future trends in meat consumption. Design/methodology/approach - Expenditure as well as Marshallian and Hicksian demand elasticities of various meats in China are evaluated using the linear almost ideal demand system. Findings - Results from this paper show that pork, the primary meat in Chinese diets, has become a necessity and that poultry, beef, mutton, and fish are considered luxuries within the meat budget allocation of Chinese households. Furthermore, the results predict that for any increase in future meat expenditure, the largest share of that increase will be allocated to pork consumption. Originality/value - This paper fills a gap currently present in the empirical literature regarding time series meat demand analysis in China. This paper makes use of newly available time series data on Chinese meat consumption and prices to estimate expenditure as well as own-price and cross-price elasticities. Implications for both domestic meat producers and grain exporters are discussed.