Cattle numbers up on 50% of farms, beef survey reveals

Diseases such as TB rank alongside costs, rent, and finance as the biggest barriers to growing a sustainable and profitable beef business, closely followed by investment needed to meet legislation or infrastructure requirements.

Farmers Weekly’s second survey of beef farmers again attracted more than 800 respondents from across the UK and Ireland.

See also: Beef sector warns falling prices may lead to fewer cattle

They have told us what they thought were the issues holding them back – and also what changes they have been making to drive their businesses forward.

Respondents cited diseases (41%) and cost issues (40%), with investment a close third (38%), as their greatest stumbling blocks.

Extreme weather events (28%) were also high on the list, while public perception of beef farming was cited by just 10% as hindering progress.

Other reasons given ranged from access to local abattoirs, farmer age (some were close to retirement) and government policy, to environmental restrictions, unhelpful landlords and inheritance tax.

Cattle numbers up for many

Despite this, 50% of respondents had grown their herd over the past five years – up from 33% in Farmers Weekly’s 2024 survey.

Some 28% had increased cattle numbers by between 10% and 50%. A further 21% of people said there had been “no change” to herd size.

Allowing for all decreases and those exiting beef, the net result was a 31% increase in herd size.

Further growth was planned within the next two years by 42% of respondents, while 45% said their businesses would stay the same.

Confidence in farm potential over the coming five years was felt by 40%; there were those who were neutral (31%) and a smaller proportion said they were “not very confident” (19%) or “not at all confident” (7%).

The older generation (65 years and over) tended to be maintaining current size (54%), whereas expansion was on the agenda for those under 44 years (61%), and farms with more than 300 cattle (54%).

Who is benchmarking performance?

As well as confidence, beef farmers have picked up business skills – or would like to develop them.

Regularly benchmarking their business (monthly or annually) or reviewing performance was carried out by 67% of respondents, though it was more common on farms with 300-plus cattle (33% of farmers in this group were measuring performance), 100-plus suckler cows in their herd (29%), and on farms that had measured carbon footprint (25%).

Most respondents were recording multiple KPIs, however, just 14% said they were looking at the full economic cost of production.

Scope to improve business skills

When asked if they had done some business management training, 73% said “yes”.

But of those, the majority (56%) revealed this had been more than five years ago – only 22% had been upskilling themselves within the past year.

When asked what gaps in their knowledge they would like to address, by far the biggest demand was for business skills (33%) such as finance, budgeting or cashflows, and management including benchmarking.

One farmer wrote: “As our business grows, managing cashflows and so on, along with managing staff, is becoming more important.”

Another admitted: “I’m still working on fully understanding finances. Sometimes I probably miss opportunities where I would need to involve some borrowing to grow the business.”

A third was straightforward: “Need to be more business-minded.”

Next on the list was to improve knowledge in technical skills such as nutrition and grazing management (11%), people management (specified by 10% and more of a concern for larger farms), with apps/technology and the use of artificial intelligence also mentioned by 10%.

Surprisingly, only 2% of people were interested in learning about time management to help their wellbeing and create a work-life balance that allowed more time off farm.

Top technical innovations

However, there was interest in making some jobs on the farm faster, better or easier.

Weigh scales (electronic or manual) and farm management phone apps were the most popular technical innovations adopted in the past five years, chosen by 42% and 32% respectively.

Respondents were asked to select from a list that also included bale grazing (chosen by 14%), auto identification (7%), genomics/sexed semen (14%) and multicut silage (12%).

Observation cameras and GPS collars/virtual fencing were also mentioned.

Larger farms (200-499ha) and those in the under-44 age group were more likely to have weigh scales, farm management phone apps, and desktop management software.

Progress in grassland management

As would be expected for the UK and Ireland, grass was a major crop for beef cattle.

Some 85% of farms had permanent pasture, and 62% said they had grass leys, with a further 34% growing herbal leys.

Maize featured on 15% of farms, alongside wholecrop cereals (15%), and fodder crops such as kale (13%).

Bigger herds grew a greater range of crops, with herbal leys and maize more common in England, and permanent pasture in Scotland.

In terms of grazing, 72% said cattle were out at grass for 26 weeks or more in a year (this dropped to 42% for respondents in Scotland); just 7% were fully housed (21% of specialist finishers said their stock were fully housed).

However, when asked whether they were set stocking cattle at grass, 37% said they were, while 41% were operating a mixture of grazing methods.

Suckler cow producers were more likely (53%) to be set stocking.

Questioned about adopting alternative grazing systems, 70% said they had done so, with 82% of respondents rotationally grazing, 26% strip grazing and 22% block grazing.

Mob-grazing (17%), adaptive multipaddock grazing (5%) and techno grazing (1%) also featured.

Those with confidence in their farm’s future, and farmers who had undertaken sustainability practices, were more likely to have moved away from set stocking.

However, for those who said they had not tried an alternative, the top three reasons they gave for not doing so related to resources and space: time/labour/cost/knowledge (28%), lack of space/grazing/land layout (26%), and unsuitable land/landlord (23%).

Only 11% said they were not interested in different grazing techniques and were happy with their current system.

One farmer answered: “Conservation grazing and logistics preclude more complex grazing management strategies.”

Others were dealing with traffic issues: “Live by busy road, so not easy to move cattle around.”

People problems also featured: “Locality of urban conurbation, the public can be difficult.”

And one beef farmer said: “Landlord is Ministry of Defence – the soldiers don’t like electric fences!”

Survey findings

Who took part?
Number of suckler cows		Number of beef animals		Type of farm		Age		Enterprise on farm
None	5%	None	1%	Mixed farm lowland	40%	Under 24	2%	Beef is our main enterprise	52%
1-49	45%	1-49	18%	Productive grassland farm	25%	25-34	10%	Arable	15%
50-99	27%	50-99	22%	Productive grassland in arable area	10%	35-44	14%	Sheep	13%
100-149	13%	100-299	38%	Lowland conservation grazing	8%	45-54	17%	Dairy	7%
150-199	3%	300-599	15%	Upland in-bye farm	6%	55-64	29%	Poultry	1%
200-399	5%	600-999	4%	Mixed farm upland	5%	65 or over	28%	Pigs	1%
400+	2%	1,000+	2%	Extensive upland farm	3%			Renewables	1%
Mean: 79		Mean: 240		Mountain/ hill farm	3%			Other	10%
Base: All answering (573)		Base: All answering (823)		Base: All answering (830)		Base: All answering (711)		Base: All answering: (678)

Most respondents had suckler herds (54%), followed by breeder finishers (34%), then store growers (29%) and specialist finishers (16%).

More dairy-beef calf rearers took part (22%) this time compared with the 2024 survey (17%).

The mean number of suckler cows was 79, with farms having a mean of 240 cattle and farming 275ha.

Q: Which are the biggest barriers to growing your beef enterprise?

Q: Are you currently, or have you in the last two years, undertaken any environmental sustainability activities on your farm?

Carbon footprints were most likely to have been completed by dairy-beef calf rearers (67%), businesses with 300-plus cattle (70%) and 100-plus suckler cows (71%), as well as those confident in their prospects (64%).

Large farms (500ha-plus) counted birds (65%), while supplying wildlife habitats were favoured by the over 65 age group (64%).

Other ventures noted were use of solar and rainwater harvesting, hedge establishment and pond maintenance.

Q: What are the biggest health issues in your cattle?

Animal Health and Welfare Pathway (AHWP) vet funding had been used by 37% of respondents.

And although diseases such as TB, bluetongue and Schmallenberg were cited in barriers to progress, the latter two were listed in the “other” category when it came to specifying actual health issues on farm.

Additional problems experienced by beef cattle (but not statistically significant) were pneumonia, eye problems, blackleg, leptospirosis and neospora, fluke, worms, and mycoplasma.

Some farms reported “no health issues” at all.

Q: What gaps in your own skills/knowledge would you like to address, such as skills around developing your technical skills, your business, managing people, etc?

Q: Which financial KPIs do you record?

---

Thanks to our project partners National Beef Association, Dunbia and KW Feeds. Farmers Weekly had full editorial control of this report.