USHSLA statistics fail to reflect record hide prices
21/05/2014
However, USHSLA has pointed out that official export data “overinflates” the number of pieces exported, and that the US government is looking into other ways of reporting this data. USHSLA says that this discrepancy produces per piece values that “grossly underestimate” the true value of hides.
High hide prices in the later part of 2013 generated a lot of publicity and widespread complaints from tanners.
In the first three months of 2014, US packers shipped a collective total of 9.5 million raw hides to tanners around the world. This figure represents an increase of 10% compared to the same months in 2013. However, the increase in value is given as only 6%, with shipments in the first quarter of 2014 bringing in export earnings of almost $472.5 million compared to $447 million a year earlier.
For wet blue, the total number of hides shipped in the first quarter of 2014 was just under 4 million, a 16% increase in volume compared to the same quarter last year. These export shipments brought US wet blue tanners revenues of $224.1 million in 2014, compared to $190.7 million in 2013, an increase of 18%. It’s important to point out that USHSLA includes full grains, top grains and drop splits in this calculation.
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