Veterinary
Though modest in size, Nordic and Baltic veterinary markets offer also interesting opportunities for foreign providers. All of these countries also have well funded research institutes, with specialities connected to the country's main animal productions, and welcome cooperation with foreign organisations.
The biggest veterinary markets of the whole region are Sweden, Finland and Denmark, all 3 being of fairly similar size.
The pig sector is in most countries an important submarket, especially in Denmark (more than 26 M pigs slaughtered or exported alive in 2007), usually followed by cattle and pets. Fur animals breeding is also a traditional activity in the Nordic and Baltic countries: Denmark and Finland are respectively world leaders in mink and fox fur production.
Almost half of the veterinary market in Norway is connected to aquaculture, and local companies like Pharmaq have developed a key expertise in the field.
One of the particularities of the Nordic markets is that a significant proportion of the vets are employed by municipalities, in the same way as doctors and other healthcare professionals are. In Finland the number of vets employed by municipalities is even slightly higher than the number of vets working in the private sector (both as entrepreneurs and as employees).
Few distributors are specialised in Veterinary products
The small size of national markets did not really allow the growth of independent distributors active only in this field. Most of the time, distributors have a whole healthcare or agricultural products portfolio including a few veterinary products, or a separate veterinary division only for the biggest.
Quality of local production is high, but companies have adopted the same model as in the other healthcare fields, tending to specialise in a precise field and becoming heavy exporters. For example, Orion is a market leader in animal sedatives for the whole region and Haico has developed a strong expertise in Equine veterinary equipment.
Purchases of Nordic distributors/producers by bigger international groups have occurred frequently in the past few years, the most recent one being the purchase of the Danish company Pharmalett by French Virbac in 2008.
Useful links
Sweden
Finland
Denmark
Norway
Estonia
Latvia
Lithuania
Iceland
Events
28-30th October 2009:
Helsinki, Finland
5-6th November 2009:
Uppsala, Sweden
25-27th November 2009:
Uppsala, Sweden.
