Cattle

Cattle keeping is an impor­tant field of live­stock keeping. Most of the holdings specialise in dairy cattle, fatte­ning cattle or suckler cow husbandry.

In addition to the numbers of cows, bulls, calves and young cattle, please also find results on the struc­ture of the cattle popu­lation in this section. The data are collec­ted half-yearly in May and November by the survey of cattle stocks.

Current data on the production of milk is provided by the Federal Office for Agriculture and Food.

Pigs

Besides cattle keeping, pig keeping is the most important branch of livestock production in German agriculture. Central fields are the fattening of pigs and the production of piglets.
The pigs section provides an insight into the structure, operation and development of pig keeping in Germany. The data are collected half-yearly in May and Novem¬ber by the survey of pig stocks.

Sheep

Compared with cattle, pig and poultry keeping, sheep farming is a rather small branch of livestock keeping in Germany. Nevertheless, sheep keeping does play a role in landscape management and in the production of milk, meat and wool.
In this section you will find information on the total number of sheep, on ewes and dairy sheep, lambs, rams and other sheep. The data are collected half-yearly in May and Novem¬ber by the survey of sheep flocks.

Poultry

Poultry keeping has gained in importance in Germany over the last few decades.
In this section you will find information on stocks of laying hens and broilers, geese, ducks and turkeys, on the keeping of laying hens, egg production, hatching eggs and newly hatched chicks. The data are compiled from several surveys of the poultry industry.

Other livestock

This section comprises information on the number of equidae and goats in agricultural holdings. Equidae are horses, asses, mules and hinnies. For goat keeping please find results such as the total number of goats, the number of female goats for breeding and information on the structure of goat keeping.
Data on goats and equidae are collected at intervals of three years by the agricultural structure surveys. For information on the production of horse and goat meat please refer to the slaughterings section.

Slaughterings

In this section you will find results relating to slaughterings and meat production, that is the number of cattle, calves, pigs, sheep, goats and horses slaughtered, the amount of meat obtained and the average slaughtering weight as well as information on the production of poultry.
This section also contains results relating to slaughter animal and meat inspections and to slaughter poultry and poultry meat inspections. They give an overview of the type and scope of inspections carried out, the number of objections and reasons for objections.
The data are obtained monthly from slaughterings and meat inspections.