PORKER
Well-known member
WORLD BEEF SUPPLY WARNING
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UNITED KINGDOM: National Beef Association warns that world beef supplies can no longer be taken for granted.
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Argentina's sudden decision to block beef exports until September due to foot- and-mouth disease confirms that United Kingdom supermarkets are wrong to think South America is an endless source of beef, according to the British National Beef Association. The NBA added that a global beef shortage may be closer than many of the U.K. 's retail strategists think.
The NBA has warned retailers that they are ignoring the well-being of the domestic industry at their long term peril and are foolish to rely on imports to maintain supplies when the increase in global consumption generated by new consumers joining the beef-eating club is greater than world expansion in beef production.
"Last year Argentina exported 596,104 (metric) tons of beef but quite clearly its government now wants to give domestic consumers a chance to eat as much of this as they can themselves," NBA chief executive Robert Forster said. "Some 26,600 (metric) tons of Argentine Hilton quota steak cuts, much of it for German customers, will still arrive in the European Union this year but it is a drop in the ocean compared with consumer demand which even in the United Kingdom accounts for over a million (metric) tons annually. The next question is how long will it be before Brazil's export surplus also dries up when tens of millions of new beef consumers are released onto its domestic market because its increasingly stable economy has continued to expand?"
According to the NBA some supermarket buyers may be comforted by the current 2.35 million-metric-ton export surplus in Brazil and the delivery of around 38 percent of this - FMD permitting - into E.U. markets.
"This not only ignores the increasing global pressure that is likely to focus on Brazil as a result of the unacceptable appropriation of rain forest land and exploitation of cheap labor that has fueled its recent production expansion but also takes no account of massive increases in demand taking place elsewhere," Forster commented. "The most recent examination of the global production-consumption balance shows that the only surplus beef is in Australia, New Zealand, and South America at a time when millions of new consumers in China and India are only just beginning to lick their lips and could soon emerge as customers that even Brazil will find impossible to supply."
Experts expect South Korea and Japan to continue to accept all the beef that New Zealand and Australia can export to them. Because Russia and North America are in a beef deficit, and looking to what is left in South America, it is difficult to see how any U.K. supermarket can think its supplies are secure unless it is certain it can buy all it needs off the home market.
"No one knows exactly when a world deficit will emerge," Forster said. "Will it be next year, in five years time or will it take another ten? However there is agreement that a global shortage will emerge and this month's developments in Argentina have already brought it closer."
Web posted: March 24, 2006
Category: Marketing,Trade
In Europe:Chris Harris, Editor or
In North America: Bryan Salvage, Editorial Director
Chicken Flu has stopped poultry meat eating and caused hugh beef
price increases in some flu infected countrys.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
UNITED KINGDOM: National Beef Association warns that world beef supplies can no longer be taken for granted.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Argentina's sudden decision to block beef exports until September due to foot- and-mouth disease confirms that United Kingdom supermarkets are wrong to think South America is an endless source of beef, according to the British National Beef Association. The NBA added that a global beef shortage may be closer than many of the U.K. 's retail strategists think.
The NBA has warned retailers that they are ignoring the well-being of the domestic industry at their long term peril and are foolish to rely on imports to maintain supplies when the increase in global consumption generated by new consumers joining the beef-eating club is greater than world expansion in beef production.
"Last year Argentina exported 596,104 (metric) tons of beef but quite clearly its government now wants to give domestic consumers a chance to eat as much of this as they can themselves," NBA chief executive Robert Forster said. "Some 26,600 (metric) tons of Argentine Hilton quota steak cuts, much of it for German customers, will still arrive in the European Union this year but it is a drop in the ocean compared with consumer demand which even in the United Kingdom accounts for over a million (metric) tons annually. The next question is how long will it be before Brazil's export surplus also dries up when tens of millions of new beef consumers are released onto its domestic market because its increasingly stable economy has continued to expand?"
According to the NBA some supermarket buyers may be comforted by the current 2.35 million-metric-ton export surplus in Brazil and the delivery of around 38 percent of this - FMD permitting - into E.U. markets.
"This not only ignores the increasing global pressure that is likely to focus on Brazil as a result of the unacceptable appropriation of rain forest land and exploitation of cheap labor that has fueled its recent production expansion but also takes no account of massive increases in demand taking place elsewhere," Forster commented. "The most recent examination of the global production-consumption balance shows that the only surplus beef is in Australia, New Zealand, and South America at a time when millions of new consumers in China and India are only just beginning to lick their lips and could soon emerge as customers that even Brazil will find impossible to supply."
Experts expect South Korea and Japan to continue to accept all the beef that New Zealand and Australia can export to them. Because Russia and North America are in a beef deficit, and looking to what is left in South America, it is difficult to see how any U.K. supermarket can think its supplies are secure unless it is certain it can buy all it needs off the home market.
"No one knows exactly when a world deficit will emerge," Forster said. "Will it be next year, in five years time or will it take another ten? However there is agreement that a global shortage will emerge and this month's developments in Argentina have already brought it closer."
Web posted: March 24, 2006
Category: Marketing,Trade
In Europe:Chris Harris, Editor or
In North America: Bryan Salvage, Editorial Director
Chicken Flu has stopped poultry meat eating and caused hugh beef
price increases in some flu infected countrys.
