Tag Archives: China

A new Te Aroha emerges from the ashes

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Silver Fern Farms' Te Aroha exterior.Two years after Silver Fern Farms’ Te Aroha beef processing operation was destroyed by fire in December 2010, a state of the art facility opened in December and is up and running in its place.

Silver Fern Farms’ new $67m Te Aroha plant is a hot-boned beef processing operation designed for best practice processing of manufacturing cows, bulls, steers and heifers from farmer suppliers across the Waikato region.

It joins a network of 23 Silver Fern Farms processing facilities employing over 7,000 staff throughout the country. Te Aroha will employ up to 380 staff when operating at full capacity with two shifts in peak season with an annual capacity of 125,000 cattle.

At the plant’s official opening in December last year, Silver Fern Farms chief executive, Keith Cooper, said the new design reflected the company’s focus on plant economics and best practice processing and the investment was testament to the co-operative’s strong confidence in the sector.

The plant has been designed in consultation with internationally recognised experts in process layout and ergonomics. It is compliant with New Zealand, EU, US Department of Agriculture (USDA), and Chinese hygiene requirements and also to halal standards for the Middle East, Malaysia and Indonesia.

Te Aroha incorporates the latest meat processing technologies; including sophisticated traceability and yield measurement systems.

Te Aroha, December 2013: Computerised Marel Streamline technology monitors meat as it passes through slaughter, grading and boning processes. The plant is configured with a custom-designed two-level Milmeq slaughterboard. Extensive use is made of RFID tags, with scanning stations at slaughter, grading and boning stages, monitored through the new Marel Streamline computerised deboning and trimming system. The process has been designed for complete traceability and to enable Silver Fern Farms to closely monitor key production indicators.

Rapid feedback

This system has the capability to deliver rapid feedback to plant staff on how closely they are meeting customer requirements for particular cuts. This fits with Silver Fern Farms’ plate-to-pasture strategy where consumer requirements are driving process improvements in order for the company to extract higher value returns from products.

This data collection is underpinned by the Primary Growth Partnership FarmIQ joint venture programme – an investment of $151 million by Silver Fern Farms, Landcorp Farming, Tru-Test Group and the Ministry of Primary Industries.

Over the seven years of the programme the aim is to integrate the red meat value chain to maximise returns to farmer partners.

For farmers, information collected at the Te Aroha plant on meat yield and quality can be used to inform farm management decisions as they look for avenues to lift farm system performance. This information can also be married with information from the insights FarmIQ will bring from consumers so farmers can produce to target higher-value returns from specific consumers.

Trimming to specification

Boning room technology at SFF Te Aroha.Following break-down and deboning, the primal cuts are distributed to work stations on the trimming line, based on operator availability. They are then trimmed according to individual specifications and all cuts are fully traceable. The automated conveyor system will enable Silver Fern Farms to closely monitor and control critical key production indicators in real time throughout the complete processing cycle. These include yield, throughput, cutting performance, giveaway and loss of sales. These are automatically registered and monitored for the entire line as well as for the individual operator, using Innova intelligent production control software.

Provision has been made for future installation of technologies including robotic bagging.

Sustainability top-of-mind

Eco-efficiency and sustainability were top-of-mind considerations. As a result, the new plant uses significantly less electricity and water per head and discharges less effluent per animal processed, setting new benchmarks in line with global customer requirements.

Keith Cooper says the rebuild gives the company an opportunity to review the environmental footprint of the operation. “Our focus is improving environmental efficiency while reducing costs through better use of resources and reduction of waste.”

The plant has also been orientated to ensure noisy areas and truck movements are at the centre or the rear of the plant, away from neighbours. Every effort has been made to reduce noise coming from the plant, even to the point that refrigeration equipment, undamaged by the fire, was relocated.

Health and safety focus

Te Aroha, December 2013: Trim stations are individually tailored for each workeer's reach to meat, height and access to work stations.Health and safety was another major focus for the company when developing the specifications for the new facility. Process areas have been designed to minimise workstation hazards. A suite of solutions to minimise lifting, turning and carrying were factored into the design. The boning room has European-designed workstations intended to maximize productivity by minimising operator fatigue and discomfort. At trim stations adjustable work heights, reach to meat and easy access to work positions make for a safer and more comfortable work environment for staff.

Separate viewing areas let people observe the slaughter and boning processes without interfering with workers on the floor. The plant layout also factors in separation between pedestrian and heavy vehicle movement areas to provide a safer environment for people.

Throughout the rebuilding process, Silver Fern Farms endeavoured to provide alternative options for staff whose livelihoods were affected by the fire, to the extent of making positions available at other company plants in the North Island and providing accommodation supplements in the early stages. The company’s significant capital spend also has provided positive spin-offs to the local economy as a result of the number of contractors throughout the region engaged during the course of construction.

Cooper says the co-operative’s loyal farmer-suppliers in the area were particularly supportive of the company through the re-build.

“We are grateful to those suppliers who have stood by us and persevered while we got the new plant up and running – we know the disruption has been an inconvenience for many. But we are enthusiastic about the service levels and advantages we can now offer them as a result of our investment.”

Pictured at the Te Aroha opening are (left to right): local MP Scott Simpson; John Key; Eoin Garden chairman Silver Fern Farms; Keith Cooper, chief executive Silver Fern Farms; Kevin Winders, chief operating officer Silver Fern Farms.

Pictured at the Te Aroha opening are (left to right): local MP Scott Simpson; John Key; Eoin Garden chairman Silver Fern Farms; Keith Cooper, chief executive Silver Fern Farms; Kevin Winders, chief operating officer Silver Fern Farms.

 

This article has appeared in Food NZ magazine (February/March 2013) and is reproduced here with permission.

Pure South beef, venison and lamb to Singapore

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Pure South is on the menu in SingaporeLeading meat processor and exporter Alliance Group is now supplying Pure South beef, venison and lamb to a restaurant  in Singapore’s iconic waterfront precinct.

The cooperative’s export brand is on the menu at Singapore’s Fern & Kiwi restaurant, an offshoot of the Lone Star bar and restaurant. The restaurant, located in a refurbished warehouse in the upmarket waterfront dining area of Clarke Quay, is the Lone Star’s first outlet outside of New Zealand.

It follows trials with Fern & Kiwi and its executive consultant chef, former New Zealand Master Chef guest Mathew Metcalfe. Metcalfe has cooked for the world’s rich and famous including Apple founder, the late Steve Jobs, and leading figures in Hollywood.

The lamb, beef and venison is sourced from farms across the country and processed at Alliance’s Group’s eight plants.

Murray Brown, general manager, marketing at Alliance Group, said Singapore is  known as a leading culinary city in Asia, which is a major area of growth for Alliance Group.

“Pure South is now well-established as an export brand after more than a decade representing Alliance Group’s products in Asia. Pure South lamb, beef and venison is New Zealand’s leading brand in many leading restaurants and top hotels throughout Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong and increasingly in the main cities in China.

“With Singapore having the world’s fourth highest income per capita, Fern & Kiwi is expected to help promote  the New Zealand brand in Asia. The quality of the cuisine is excellent and the restaurant is the perfect fit for Pure South.

“Pure South symbolises all the key elements of Alliance Group – the pure southern location, world-class technology, production techniques, the proud heritage and the very best grass-fed red meat.”

Established in 1988, Lone Star is a Kiwi institution with 21 branches across the North and South Islands. The Clarke Quay site is the first restaurant to open since the flagship outlet was destroyed in the devastating Christchurch earthquakes.

Outlook cloudy for 2013

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Allan BarberHappy New Year to you all. Meat industry commentator Allan Barber has already had his head down thinking about what’s likely to pan out for the industry later in 2013.

His latest blog, which also appears at www.interest.co.nz, talks of a weak US dollar, weak export demand and low prices for Kiwi producers. However, Allan’s picking that there will be less effect on New Zealand beef than on sheepmeat and he foresees more pressure on lamb this year.

Looking globally, he sees aversion of the fiscal cliff in the US, will allow US economic recovery to emerge, will also allow recovery in China and for Europe to “move further back from its own economic disaster”. In turn, both New Zealand and Australia should avoid the worst impact of an extended downturn in main markets, he says.

His “big questions” for 2013 are whether all meat companies will survive the year and whether the increasing use of farm data will assist the co-operation between farmer and meat processor. Read more …

Debt is good under some circumstances, says Barber

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Allan BarberAfter Allan Barber’s column last week about meat industry debt levels, Keith Cooper, chief executive of Silver Fern Farms, took him to task for incorrectly reporting the situation with Silver Fern Farms’ debt facility, he writes in his latest guest blog.

I stated that these expired in September 2012 and therefore the company was operating on a temporary extension. The correct position was that the debt facility was originally negotiated for two years from September 2010 and consequently due to expire in September 2012. This remained the position at balance date in September 2011. However in the 2012 annual report, the facility was stated as expiring on 31 December 2012.

Clearly, the company had arranged a three month extension at some point before the original two year facility expired and this was not a temporary facility, as I implied. Nevertheless, it was no more than a three month extension, while the next longer term arrangement was being negotiated.

I apologise for any incorrect interpretation, but still maintain the company’s current debt level at balance date was higher than could be considered comfortable.

However, in an interview with Jamie Mackay on the Farming Show last week, when asked to comment on the industry’s debt level, Cooper gave his opinion that the debt was a good thing. Because it was tied up in inventories, it would ensure the industry acted responsibly. This is almost exactly what I wrote last week, although I saw the discipline on the companies as a necessity, not a virtue.

In Cooper’s radio interview, he stated after record prices last year, meat companies are reining things in.

“It’s a damn good thing we do have stock in store and we do have high debt because that means meat companies are acting responsibly, and are feeding the product to market to create stability of price. I’m quite happy that us and other companies have debt because that means they’ve got stock in store and that means we’re managing markets well.”

I must give Keith credit for being unreservedly a ‘glass half full’ kind of guy which you have to be to survive in what I believe is New Zealand’s toughest industry. He promises farmers that things will improve.

“We are living in volatile times. There will be volatility, but through the volatility we will see a steady increase in the price we will receive from offshore,” and he expects meat companies will pay farmers around 90 dollars per lamb this year.

I’m not sure the glass is quite as half full as Keith Cooper suggests, especially in the sheep meat market. Although lamb leg prices in the UK are holding fairly well, especially for chilled product, prices for middle cuts, like racks, loins and tenderloins, in North America and Europe are under pressure.

The price of loins and tenderloins have dropped by as much as 30 percent in the last couple of months, while there are fears of another collapse in lamb rack prices because of competition from low priced Australian product. As a result, importers are not placing orders for New Zealand lamb, because they remember the last time prices collapsed.

The Middle East has gone quiet on lamb shoulders because of cheaper Australian product, although China is still firm. Here, it appears New Zealand exporters benefit from less Australian competition with fewer China licensed plants in Australia.

All this explains why the New Zealand consumer is able to buy plenty of well priced lamb available on the domestic market. But this won’t provide more than a minimal contribution to managing the existing inventory levels and it certainly won’t cope with next year’s peak production. The industry will be keeping its fingers and toes crossed for an early economic uplift in our main markets, UK, Europe and North America, because otherwise the glass won’t have much in it at all.

Allan Barber is an agribusiness commentator, with particular interest in the meat industry. He has his own blog Barber’s Meaty Issues. This item has also appeared at www.interest.co.nz.

Pet food and jerky emerging as export growth opportunities

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Pet food and prepared/processed beef products like beef jerky, or biltong, are two emerging growth opportunities for the New Zealand meat industry that have been identified in a newly released Coriolis report An Investor’s Guide to Emerging Growth Opportunities in New Zealand Food and Beverage Exports.

Strategic management consultants Coriolis carried out the report on behalf of the Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) to identify emerging high potential food and beverage export categories.

The report filtered out various export categories over $100 million each, such as boneless frozen and chilled lamb, bone-in sheepmeat, boneless and bone-in frozen and chilled beef, meat and edible offal (including venison), fats of beef, sheep or goats, as they “represent New Zealand’s core food and beverage exports” and also categories under $2 million. This left a core 129 categories for analysis.

Pet food and jerky were two of the initial 25 categories short-listed for their emerging export growth potential. Two more meat industry related categories – protein concentrates and textured protein substances and sausages – just missed the initial cut, with frozen chicken cuts also being dropped out of the final 20 as it had low potential export growth.

Pet food has a large global market, strongly growing demand and opportunities for growth in Asia, especially China, Australia and other rich countries, the analysis shows alongside information showing the category is capital intensive, requires some skills and has moderate trade access. Pet food has already attracted investment from US-owned Watties and Mars NZ and Swiss-owned Nestle NZ. Currently, exports are worth US$169 million, out of a global market worth US$13.8 billion, but the “possible size of the prize” by 2025 could be in excess of US$500 million, says Coriolis.

Beef jerky has received inward investment from US company Jack Link’s, which has grown the category markedly in recent years. New Zealand’s exports of processed/preserved beef are currently worth US$83 million, out of a global market worth US$7.4 billion, but he potential prize lies between $100-200 million for the category to 2025, says Coriolis. Opportunities lie in Asia, but making jerky is a capital intensive process that requires skills.. The UK is seen to have potential for the product

Report: a “vital resource”

New Zealand Food and Grocery Council chief executive Katherine Rich says the report is a vital resource for anyone in the food industry or someone looking to invest in it. This is the first time this information has been collected in such as easy-to-reference format.

“The food industry is the backbone of the economy and is always looking for investment to grow export opportunities. It is important that this additional investment is attracted so new Zealand can take advantage of the significant growth opportunities presenting themselves, particularly in Asia as the middle class there grows,” she says.

“It is perhaps not surprising that the sectors identified by the report as showing the greatest potential to grab these opportunities are ones where New Zealand could have a competitive advantage: salmon, honey, spirits, biscuits, pet food, cherries and infant formula,” says Rich, adding that there are other areas too, including beef jerky.

“As the report identifies, our exports of these top categories in 2010 were greater than the wine industry ($1.03 billion as against $951 million) and most of them are growing faster than all other food and beverage exports. Some 17 of them have already attracted foreign and/or private equity investment, indicating that the market itself has identified they present strong opportunities for growth.”

The categories of processed goods are already having an impact. “But what is most exciting is that Coriolis predicts that if they all acheived their potential we would be looking at exports worth between $4.3 billion and $6.1 billion – approximately $4.9 billion additional.”

To achieve the Government’s goal of increasing exports by 40 percent by 2025, each of these categories needs to continue to grow, says Rich. “This MBIE report will play a critical role in informing this plan.”

An Investor’s Guide to Emerging Growth Opportunities in New Zealand Food and Beverage Exports can be read online at the www.foodandbeverage.govt.nz website, where you can also download a pdf copy.

 

Major new FTA to be negotiated

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A new free trade agreement, that could mean a US$500 billion boost to the Asian region’s economy by 2025, is to be negotiated it was announced today.

The New Zealand International Business Forum (NZIBF) has welcomed the announcement that the ten members of ASEAN (the Association of South East Asian Nations) and six other economies including New Zealand, Australia, China, Japan, Korea and India, intend to negotiate the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).

“This is a further sign that New Zealand’s home is in Asia” said NZIBF Chairman Sir Graeme Harrison.

“This negotiation will build on New Zealand and Australia’s existing high quality free trade agreement with ASEAN and will bring both the giant North Asian economies and India into the same network.  The initiation of a free trade negotiation with Japan is particularly welcome: Japan is now the only Asian economy with which New Zealand neither has an FTA or a negotiation underway.  A closer trade and economic relationship with Japan is strongly supported by New Zealand business and would be benefit to both countries”.

The RCEP announcement was made at the East Asia Summit meeting in Phnom Penh which is being attended by Prime Minister Key and Trade Minister Groser. The announcement follows several years of preparatory work by officials.

“We congratulate those associated with this initiative which demonstrates new leadership by the ASEAN economies. I can see several years of hard work by negotiators ahead to bring this new agreement into effect. The effort will be worth it: because of its wide coverage RCEP could be even bigger than the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) in terms of its contribution to economic welfare.”

Sir Graeme emphasised that TPP and RCEP were mutually reinforcing as potential pathways to a wider Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific (FTAAP).

“There can be many paths to a broader vision for regional economic integration. New Zealand is fortunate to be directly involved in both major initiatives. TPP is further advanced but both TPP and RCEP are significant and for New Zealand offer the possibility of eliminating barriers and reducing the cost of doing business, building the basis for economic growth and creating jobs”, concluded Sir Graeme.

ASEAN members include Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar (Burma), Singapore, Thailand, The Philippines and Viet Nam, which make up collectively the world’s ninth largest economy.

Research by the East West Centre in Honolulu and the Petersen Institute for International Economics in Washington DC suggests that Asian trade liberalisation could be worth $US500 billion to the region’s economy by 2025.

 

Deer industry about to do “hard yards’

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The time for talking is over and the deer industry is about “to do the hard yards”, says Deer Industry New Zealand (DINZ) chairman, Andy Macfarlane.

Writing in the latest Deer Industry News, Macfarlane says the “industry prize of profitability should be enough to keep us focused on the job.”

The goalpost presented at the 2012 conference has been “determined, reviewed and confirmed as $1.27 per kg venison increase in EBIT by 2022″, achieved from productivity gains alone, Macfarlane explains.

“We also believe we can increase venison tonnage by 50 percent in that time, while simultaneously improving the market return from venison, hence adding to that $1.27 per kg.”

The 50 percent increase in tonnage takes venison output back to a little less than 2007 and 2008 levels, he says, but from an organised stable herd rather than from a reduction of capital stock. The Europe venison marketing strategy and formal access into China and Korea for venison co-products and velvet underpin the on-farm market return. Member processors are now putting together their three-year marketing plans for submission to access increased DINZ funds.

In addition, after consultation with farmers, AgResearch scientists, vets, farm management consultants, processors and educationalists, Primary Growth Partnership funding is being sought from government for on-farm productivity initiatives to deliver an integrated initiative “that we are confident will deliver the additional $1.27 per kg of venison sold,” says Macfarlane, adding that by his calculations it should generate additional industry EBIT of $42 million a year.

To show commitment “by purchasing some of our own ‘training gear’”, industry is being asked to contribute 4 cents per kg of venison fro seven years (initially $900,000 a year).

“The cost is temporary but the return – over $30 per $1 of levy money initially invested – is permanent.”

The title of the PGP bid is ‘The next generation – premium by nature and design’, which he says is significant.

“We have a premium product sold in premium markets. Our animals are pasture-fed and raised in a natural environment. We are poised for our third generation of deer products, produced by our third generation of deer farmers.”

The latest Deer Industry News magazine (Issue 56, October/November 2012),  is out now. 

 

 

Global meat production and consumption curbed

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A new United States report looks at how disease and drought have curbed global meat production and consumption, notes shifts in geographical areas of production, calls for lowering individual meat consumption and for meat production to be “reconnected to the land and its natural carrying capacity”.

Global meat production rose to 270 million tonnes (297 million short US tons) in 2011, an increase of 0.8 percent over 2010 levels, and is projected to reach 270 million tonnes (302 million tons) by the end of 2012, according to new research conducted by the Washington DC-based Worldwatch Institute’s Nourishing the Planet project (www.worldwatch.org) for the Institute’s Vital Signs Online service.

In comparison, the report shows that meat production rose 2.6 percent in 2010 and has risen 20 percent since 2001. Record drought in the U.S. Midwest, animal disease outbreaks, and rising prices of livestock feed all contributed to 2011 and 2012′s lower rise in production, write report authors Danielle Nierenberg and Laura Reynolds.

Also bucking a decades-long trend, meat consumption decreased slightly worldwide in 2011, from 42.5 kilograms (kg) per person in 2010 to 42.3 kg, the authors note. Since 1995, however, per capita meat consumption has increased 15 percent overall; in developing countries, it increased 25 percent during this time, whereas in industrialised countries it increased just two percent. Although the disparity between meat consumption in developing and industrialised countries is shrinking, it remains high: the average person in a developing country ate 32.3 kg of meat in 2011, whereas in industrialised countries people ate 78.9 kg on average.

Pork was the most popular meat in 2011, accounting for 37 percent of both meat production and consumption, at 99 million tonnes (109 million tons), the report notes. This was followed closely by poultry meat, with 92 million tonnes (101 million tons) produced. Yet pork production decreased 0.8 percent from 2010, whereas poultry meat production rose three percent, making it likely that poultry will become the most-produced meat in the next few years.

The report also says that production of both beef and sheepmeat stagnated between 2010 and 2011, at 61 million and 12 million tonnes (67 million and 13 million tons), respectively

.A breakdown of meat production by geographic region reveals the dramatic shift in centres of production from industrialised to developing countries over the last decade. “In 2000, for example, North America led the world in beef production, at 12 million tonnes (13 million tons), while South America produced 11 million tonnes (12 million tons) and Asia 9.1 million tonnes (10 million tons). By 2011, North America had lowered its beef output by 180,000 tonnes (200,000 tons) and was overtaken by both South America and Asia, which produced 14 million  and 15 million tonnes (15 million and 17 million tons), respectively.”

The United Nations Food & Agriculture Organisation (FAO) puts the slowdown in growth in industrial countries to rising production costs, stagnating domestic meat consumption and competition from developing countries.

Widespread and intense drought in China, Russia, the US and the Horn of Africa contributed to lower meat production—-and higher prices—-in 2010 and 2011. The combination of high prices for meat products and outbreaks of new and recurring zoonotic diseases – those transmitted between animals and humans – in 2011 curtailed global meat consumption.  In 2011 alone, foot-and-mouth disease was detected in Paraguay, African swine fever in Russia, classical swine fever in Mexico, and avian influenza (H5N1) throughout Asia. According to a 2012 report by the International Livestock Research Institute, zoonoses cause around 2.7 million human deaths each year, and approximately 75 percent of all emerging infectious diseases now originate in animals or animal products.

Many zoonotic disease outbreaks can be traced to concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs), also known as factory farms. These systems now account for 72 percent of poultry production, 43 percent of egg production, and 55 percent of pork production worldwide.

“Factory farming systems contribute to disease outbreaks in several ways,” says Danielle Nierenberg, report co-author and Worldwatch’s Nourishing the Planet project director. “They keep animals in cramped and often unsanitary quarters, providing a breeding ground for diseases; they feed animals grain-heavy diets that lack the nutrients needed to fight off disease and illness; and many CAFOs feed animals antibiotics as a preventative rather than a therapeutic measure, causing the animals—-and the humans who consume them—-to develop resistance to antibiotics.”

But not all livestock are reared in industrial or mechanised environments. Nearly one billion people living on less than US$2 a day depend to some extent on livestock and many of these people are raising animals in the same ways that their ancestors did.

“Lowering individual meat consumption would alleviate the pressure to produce more and more meat for lower and lower prices, using rapidly dwindling natural resources,” say Nierenberg and Reynolds. “Reconnecting meat production to the land and its natural carrying capacity, as well as reducing meat consumption, can thus greatly improve both public and environmental health.”

Further highlights from the report:

  • Over the last decade, meat production grew nearly 26 percent in Asia, 28 percent in Africa and 32 percent in South America.
  • In 2012, drought and corn crop failures continue throughout the United States, causing the U.S. Department of Agriculture to estimate that by 2013, beef will cost 4-5 percent more than in 2010, pork 2.5-3.5 percent more, and poultry 3-4 percent more.

A full copy of the report can be purchased here.

 

Offshore worries persist, says Alexander

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Some weekend reading for you. In his latest BNZ Weekly Overview (18 October 2012), written during a trip to Europe, Bank of New Zealand economist Tony Alexander says offshore worries persist.

In Europe, the tipping point at which the need to maintain social cohesion outweighs seemingly sensible and necessary economic policies “is the closest it has been since this crisis started.”

He notes various central banks around the world printing money (he doesn’t advocate it for NZ), the increasing media discussion of alternative economic models and rising support in the UK for leaving the EU. He points to soaring global food prices, social tension and international divisiveness resulting from weather-induced crop failures as “very concerning” and go a long way toward explaining why his view on prospects for NZ growth is relatively sanguine.

“We are not going to boom given that people are sensibly concentrating in keeping debt ratios down, there is restraint on some price-based companies from the high NZ dollar (which will remain high), we look fundamentally good to investors as they compare economies and falling food production overseas means higher demand for our commodities and the systems we use to produce them,” he writes.

According to Alexander, challenges include: to facilitate the adjustment of some sectors to a permanently high exchange rate which they cannot live with in the long-term; “get off our butts to take advantage of the demand for our agricultural expertise”; upgrading infrastructure; improving connections between NZ businesses and those overseas; addressing the Auckland housing crisis; and building up public financial reserves to assist during the next crisis.

In addition, Alexander has set up a Facebook page, specifically for discussing the NZ-China relationship and as a tool for disseminating information and “furthering my own still inadequate knowledge,” he says.

The Weekly Overview will be available at the BNZ website in due course, where you can also subscribe by email to receive regular copies.

 

Meat export revenue down in June quarter, says MPI

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Lamb leads a drop in export meat revenue for the June 2012 quarter, according to the latest figures from the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI).

The Ministry’s Primary Industries: Production and Trade report for the June 2012 quarter, says that this is mostly because of lower export prices from weaker international demand and a build up in meat stocks in New Zealand, particularly for lamb, which fell by 25.6 percent against the same period a year earlier. Venison also  recorded a fall of 15.1 percent for the quarter and beef and veal -2.9 percent. In total,  meat export revenue for the quarter, was down 14.4 percent to $1.6 billion. Lamb production, however, was up 5.9 percent in the year ended June 2012, with slaughter numbers up 2.4 percent and carcase weights up 2.5 percent on the previous year, says MPI.

“This reflects increased numbers of lambs born in late winter and early spring 2011 and a record average carcase weight of 18.48kg.”

Beef production fell by 1.8 percent in the quarter due to lower slaughter numbers, particularly for cows and heifers, reflecting lower beef cattle inventories at the end of the 2011 season and retentions for an expanding national dairy milking herd.

Offals seem to have had a healthy year with quarterly revenue increasing for ‘other meat’ of 8.5 percent and a year-on-year increase of 10.7 percent, to end June 2012.

Another significant highlight is that China became the number one market for frozen bone-in lamb cuts in the six months to end June, with the European Union now taking second spot, according to MPI. “However, average export prices of lamb sold to China re about half that received in the EU,” the report concedes.

All but one industry grouping experienced a decline in export revenues, the report says. Overall, primary sector revenue for the June quarter was down 5.8 percent, compared with the final quarter in 2011, to $8.8 million. However,  during the year ending June 2012 there was a production-driven revenue increase of 1.3 percent to just over $32 billion, due to favourable climatic conditions, MPI says.

Climate conditions for pasture growth for the year ended June 2012 were the best since 2002, MPI notes, with 51.4 days of soil moisture deficit compared to the 20-year average of 61.6  – resulting in record carcase weights for lambs, heifers and cows and record milk solids per cow.

The full report Primary Industries: Production and Trade is available for download at the MPI website (search under Publications).