The Top 5 Countries With the Most Sheep

China Produces a lot of Sheep.

The number of sheep China produced in 2018 alone was 164,078,900 according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), which made up 13.5% of all the sheep produced in the world in 2018. China produces a lot of sheep probably because they also eat a lot of sheep. China consumed 2.7 million tonnes of sheep and lamb meat in 2018. The Chinese consume 3.2 kilos of sheep meat per person - per year, which comes in around 9th in the world in terms of per-capita consumption. (A.) (B.)

The country that consumes the most sheep per capita, is Kazakhstan at 8.2 kilograms per person - per year, while Australians eat the second amount of sheep meat per capita in the world at 6.2 kilos of sheep meat per person - per year. (B.)

The Sheep Producing Regions of the Word

There are over 1.2 billion sheep being produced globally each year. Asia produces over 42% of all the sheep in the world. Africa is the second largest sheep producing region at 31%. Europe produces almost 11% of the world's sheep, with Oceania at 8.1% and finally the Americas have close to 7% of the world's total sheep production.

Imports and Exports of Sheep.

Sudan was the world's leading exporter of sheep in 2018 at 4.5 million head, while Saudi Arabia was the country that imported the most sheep at 4.3 million. (C.)

Top 5 Special Reports Sources:

A. Global Trade. (2020). "China Leads the Expansion of Lamb And Sheep Meat Market in Asia-Pacific."
B. OECD-FAO Agricultural Outlook. (2020). Meat consumptio
C. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. (2020). Live animals database.

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