I'm a New Zealand sheep farmer and was doing some research to see what you guys get paid for your lambs over there in the UK. I found this page...

http://www.fwi.co.uk/Prices/Prices.aspx?sPage=dailygbavg

...but it doesn't say whether the prices are live weight or carcass weight. I'm assuming live weight but wanted to be sure. If anybody is interested I just sold some lambs a while ago for NZ$1.10 per kg live weight (43 pence at current exchange rate). It didn't help that most of NZ was in the middle of a drought, and our meat industry is in crisis (one of the reasons is they seem to get pummelled by your big supermarkets!). The live weight price has since gone up to around NZ$1.40 / kg, but we still can't make money at this level! How are UK sheep farmers coping at your price levels?

these are liveweight prices.

lambs are leaving a profit this year, after a disasterin 2007

they were only 60-70 p kg/lw last year, due to excess nz imports and then f&m.

a lot of the high cost early lamb producers have quit, so spring lambs are short and expensive.

you nz farmers should dictate price to tesco. they cant buy it anywhere else.

what are sheep farms worth over there per stock unit?

If it's of any useful contribution, I'd be delighted to average £60/ lamb this year after averaging approx £42/head or so last year (lamb in April/ May so hope to start selling from august time onwards). We were pretty disappointed last year to be getting offered £2.15/kg deadweight / kg pre F&M last year. This year things look a little more rosy but it'll be while before any of mine will be going off to slaughter and a lot can happen before then.

 Here's hoping we are entering the beginning of a comprehensive soft commodity boom!!

 Cooperation is indeed required between UK farmers and NZ farmers. We need to work together to market and promote our product AND to increase selling power (vs buying power).

Lamb has absolutely everything going for it. UK and NZ producers/ processors should combine and market and promote it as the most welfare friendly, sustainable, environmentally sound meat around. Which other meat in the UK can be produced on llarge scale with NO inside housing required, NO fertiliser application required other than P K and Lime occasionally, Negligible concentrate feeding required,  very little oil/ petrol required for production (1x quadbike for 1 year per 1500 ewes for example),with quality protein meat prduced from land which would often otherwise be completely unproductive. With the added potential (as oil prices skyrocket) to clothe, carpet and insulate almost every house and office in the country...hmmm..

In this day and age, the fact that this is not widely used as a promotional tool is an absolute disgrace..

Of course by the time ACTUAL value of the industry ('Actual' being before chronic market manipulation by major buying powers) has been realised it may very well be too late.

IMHO.

T8

glasshouse:

you nz farmers should dictate price to tesco

We're to busy fighting amongst ourselves to do that and I'm not sure that they would care if they didn't sell NZ lamb.

glasshouse:

due to excess nz imports

I think we will have a lot less lambs to sell for the next few years. I expect to tail about 1000 less lambs next year mostly because a shortage of grass this Autumn has stopped me mating hoggets but also because we're growing more cereals and have taken on more dairy grazing.

You can buy a sheep farm next to me for about $2500 per SU or if you wont to go to less favourable area its about $500 per SU (unless an American movie star or DOC wont to buy it then you have no show).

t80:

Here's hoping we are entering the beginning of a comprehensive soft commodity boom!!

 Cooperation is indeed required between UK farmers and NZ farmers. We need to work together to market and promote our product AND to increase selling power (vs buying power).

Lamb has absolutely everything going for it. UK and NZ producers/ processors should combine and market and promote it as the most welfare friendly, sustainable, environmentally sound meat around. Which other meat in the UK can be produced on llarge scale with NO inside housing required, NO fertiliser application required other than P K and Lime occasionally, Negligible concentrate feeding required,  very little oil/ petrol required for production (1x quadbike for 1 year per 1500 ewes for example),with quality protein meat prduced from land which would often otherwise be completely unproductive. With the added potential (as oil prices skyrocket) to clothe, carpet and insulate almost every house and office in the country...hmmm..

In this day and age, the fact that this is not widely used as a promotional tool is an absolute disgrace..

I like the way you are thinking. I hope we can sort ourselves out  in the next few years and perhaps even enter into a joint promotion with UK producers.

Hill country sheep and beef farms have come back substantially in price over the last 6 months or so, partly because of the drought but mostly because the returns have been disastrous over the last 2 years. You can buy a farm on the coast in my wider area (over an hour to a major town) for around $400 per stock unit. Closer to town on better country you're looking at $700 / SU. If you're close to dairy farmers and there's any potential to winter dairy cows (ie rolling not steep country) then the price is through the roof - a 33ha farm not too far from us went for NZ$2 Million the other day!

glasshouse:

you nz farmers should dictate price to tesco. they cant buy it anywhere else.

 You tell our meat companies that! They compete with eachother to get rid of the product, so Tesco's (or one of the other big four) plays one against the other to get the cheapest price. That's the way I see it anyway. A group called the Meat Industry Action Group (MIAG) has been set up over here to try to sort out our meat companies, with the end goal moving towards one single seller (more like Fonterra, our big dairy Co-op), to have more clout against these huge buyers who can set the price.

t80:

Here's hoping we are entering the beginning of a comprehensive soft commodity boom!!

 Cooperation is indeed required between UK farmers and NZ farmers. We need to work together to market and promote our product AND to increase selling power (vs buying power).

Lamb has absolutely everything going for it. UK and NZ producers/ processors should combine and market and promote it as the most welfare friendly, sustainable, environmentally sound meat around. Which other meat in the UK can be produced on llarge scale with NO inside housing required, NO fertiliser application required other than P K and Lime occasionally, Negligible concentrate feeding required,  very little oil/ petrol required for production (1x quadbike for 1 year per 1500 ewes for example),with quality protein meat prduced from land which would often otherwise be completely unproductive. With the added potential (as oil prices skyrocket) to clothe, carpet and insulate almost every house and office in the country...hmmm..

 Hear! Hear! Get our meat companies to work together, more like the oil companies do, and agree not to sell below a certain price or something similar that works around fair trading acts, etc.

kiwi sheep farmer, you are wrong that tesco dont care if they sell nz lamb.

They use your underpriced product to hammer our prices, and without it they would have to dance to our tune.

They are spewing at the moment , since the pound fell by 15%recently, cattle and sheep are being exported to europe in a flood. Away from their slippery , slimy, grasp.

They are also being slugged by a regulator to stamp out their abuse of suppliers.

Just back from the market where exporters are paying £85 for spring lambs and £65 for hoggets.

I saw 1 big suffolk make £100

Auctioneer was grinning from ear to ear.

ewenique, what part of nz are you in?

glasshouse:

kiwi sheep farmer, you are wrong that tesco dont care if they sell nz lamb.

They use your underpriced product to hammer our prices, and without it they would have to dance to our tune.

Our biggest meat company (PPCS) made a loss last year when you guys reckon NZ was flooding the market with cheap lamb. On top of that, my accountant told me that only 3% of his sheep and beef clients in my region made a profit last year. Those big buyers like Tesco's must have a hell of a lot of clout, otherwise the marketing teams in our meat companies need to be shot, and we'll come and poach those buyers from Tesco's and put them in instead!

glasshouse, you asked what part of NZ I'm in - Wairarapa (bottom of the North Island)

I have learnt , as have many other farmers, that if you want to prosper, then you must not deal with the supermarkets. They have been screwing us for 20 yrs, and now they are screwing nz farmers. They will take the shirt off your back, the food out your kids mouths, and kick you into the gutter as they move on to the next victim.

They are immoral, greedy, grasping ruiners of lives.

I know too many people whose lives have gone up the creek due to supermarket tactics.

They have collectively reduced milk production in the uk by about 20%, by predatory pricing.

They have made fantastic profits over the last 10 yrs, when we couldnt export livestock.

ppcs and the other one must merge together, and set prices which are sustainable for all.

Sheep production is dropping worldwide, they cant buy volume anywhere else.

glasshouse:

you are wrong that tesco dont care if they sell nz lamb.

I was under the impression that they only cared about maximising profit per metre of shelf space. The Americans seem to get on OK without eating lamb. I support the consolidation of our meat industry but i can't see us ever being able to dictate terms to the supermarkets.

glasshouse:

1 big suffolk make £100