World Poultry Map 2025: Slower trade growth and changing trade flows amid higher volatility

RaboResearch has just published the fifth edition of its World Poultry Map, which presents an overview of key developments in global poultry markets, with a strong focus on trade. The trade flows shown on the map have changed significantly since the 2018 edition due to slower market growth, more trade restrictions, higher volatility, and the rise of newcomers in trade.

Global trade in poultry is a USD 32.5bn market (and USD 48bn if intra-EU trade is included), dominated by several countries and regions, including Brazil, the US, the EU, Thailand, and China. Chicken trade can be split into four main submarkets: dark meat, breast meat, whole chicken, and further processed chicken. Each subcategory has distinct trade dynamics and value propositions.

Since the last World Poultry Map in 2018, the industry has experienced major disruptions, including Covid-19 (resulting in less foodservice trade), avian influenza (leading to more trade restrictions), African swine fever in pigs (causing a demand shift to chicken), a slowdown in economic growth (reducing spending power), and high and volatile feed costs (impacting chicken prices). The industry has also seen impacts from geopolitical tensions due to the Ukraine war, turmoil in the Middle East, and increased trade tensions between Western countries and China amid its heightened focus on food security. These disruptions have led to a more volatile trade environment with constantly changing trade flows.

The biggest global importers of chicken are China, Japan, the EU, the UK, Mexico, and Saudi Arabia. Since our previous map, China, the Philippines, Mexico, and the UK have imported significantly more chicken, while South Africa, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States, the EU, and Japan have imported less. In general, trade growth is slower than production for local markets. Brazil has been the big winner in this slow-growing global market, capturing 90% of global trade growth since 2018, followed by Thailand, China, Ukraine, and Russia. The EU and the US have seen their exports decline since 2018.

In the coming years, we expect slow global trade growth to continue, with ongoing price volatility. Brazilian exports are expected to remain strong, while Thailand, China, Russia, and Ukraine are likely to further expand their share.

> Click here to download the World Poultry Map 2025

Poster versions of the World Poultry Map are exclusively available to Rabobank clients. To receive one, please contact your relationship manager.