Struggling pig farmers have welcomed a £10m commitment by supermarket giant Tesco to pay producers more money for their pork.

Norfolk farmer Rob Mutimer, who is chairman of the National Pig Association (NPA), wrote to the retailer earlier this month to appeal for better prices, after most other supermarkets had already taken steps to improve their support to the financially-stricken sector.

Farmers are facing estimated losses of £50 per pig as production costs soar due to record animal feed prices, driven by rising wheat prices caused by the war in Ukraine.

Tesco has now announced an "accelerated and enhanced payment plan" which will see its suppliers increase payments to farmers by £6.6m until August.

The company said this will bring its support for farmers to a total of £10m since the start of March 2022, and pledged to work with its suppliers to "ensure the investment gets passed to farmers as quickly as possible".

Mr Mutimer said: "This is a very welcome boost for beleaguered pig farmers, who are currently facing unprecedented costs of production and need a tangible increase in the price they are being paid in order to stay in business.

"We look forward to seeing the pig price rising very soon as a result of this action and hopefully we can begin to stem the flow of producers exiting the industry."

Tesco also said it had been working to ease the lingering backlog of thousands of pigs on East Anglian farms, caused by post-Brexit labour shortages in meat factories and complicated by Covid absences.

Since January, the retailer said it has taken an extra 32,000 pigs, and plans to take a further extra 22,000 in the months ahead.

Tesco fresh commercial director Dominic Morrey said: "We fully recognise the seriousness of the situation UK pig farmers are facing and have been working closely with our suppliers to understand what more we can do to support the sector.

"On top of the increased volume of British pork we’re now offering our customers, we will be increasing payments to British pig farmers by £10m through to August this year.

"We know there is more to do, and we will be working with suppliers, farmers and the wider industry to drive more transparency and sustainability across our supply chains and support the future of the British pig industry.”