![]() ![]() If you’ve got a farm that can run 1000 cattle or 1000 sheep, you can’t go buy another 500 because they’re cheap because you’re fully stocked,” he says. But there are no farmers, they’ve all stopped. But only meatworks like the ones he operates in Dubbo in NSW and near Albany in WA are buying at the lower prices with very little farmer-to-farmer trade. Both are drivers of hot and dry weather in Australia.įletcher says livestock producers hung on to lamb and cattle in the good seasons and now their farms are full. The Bureau of Meteorology has warned of a double whammy of El Nino and the lesser-known “positive” Indian Ocean Dipole, which brings warmer seas, fewer clouds and less rain. ![]() Market analysts warn prices have not reached the bottom if the forecast for drier seasons proves accurate. Meat & Livestock Australia data shows cattle prices broadly down almost 50 per cent on last year and sheep prices down 37 per cent. The shipping issues have faded, but key export markets have been slow to work through a big build in meat inventories and demand is weaker than hoped as China and other economies struggle. And while we bred back up, we had COVID-19, we didn’t process as much as we should’ve and then shipping to export customers was a disaster,” he says. “The drought broke and then we had some super good years, so everyone bred back up. The prospect of drier conditions and the accuracy of modern weather forecasting has them spooked after three rainy years that produced record grain harvests, which were used to build up herd and flock numbers.įletcher says the livestock price plunge was inevitable at the first sign of no clouds on the horizon. Luke Hibbardįarmers with the mental scars from the last east coast drought have spent most of this year hearing warnings about the onset of an El Nino weather pattern, and the Bureau of Meteorology made it official last Tuesday. Veteran farmer and meat processor Roger Fletcher says weather forecasts are usually on the money these days. While consumers might find lower meat prices on the supermarket shelves, which may feed into easing food inflation, that will be cold comfort for those on the land. While farming is a cyclical business and notorious for its boom and bust nature, agricultural industry players say this pain threatens to get much worse due to a rare combination of problems on both the supply and demand side of farming. Roger Fletcher says the two things that keep farmers up at night are the weather forecast and being left holding sheep and cattle they can’t properly, or profitably, feed and water.įletcher, one of Australia’s biggest farmers and meat processors, says these fears are gripping the livestock industry this spring, amid one of the worst markets for sheep and cattle since the last drought.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |