Argentine Ban Beefing up UK Prices

UK - Beef production in the UK is on the decline, a trend that is almost certain to continue, despite a substantial improvement in the ex-farm price.
calendar icon 26 August 2008
clock icon 2 minute read

According to Scotsman, the latest slaughter figures from the economics division of the Agricultural and Horticultural Development Board show that in the first seven months of this year total slaughterings of prime cattle fell to 1.2 million from nearly 1.3 million in the same period of 2007

In Scotland the fall in animals processed in abattoirs was almost 24,000 lower than last year's level.

But this is no local phenomenon: it is being replicated throughout all of the major beef-producing countries in the world, reports the Scotsman.

They newspaper says that Argentina has a reputation of producing some of the very best beef in the world, mainly from Aberdeen-Angus and Hereford cattle, reared extensively on the pampas – vast areas of natural grassland. But life has been tough for the operators of the large ranches. In the first six months of this year, beef production in Argentina at 1.44 million tonnes is estimated to be down by at least 6 per cent on the same period last year.

Inflation is rife in Argentina, a country where the per capita consumption of beef is an astonishing 64kg – in the UK it is a shade over 16kg. The government in Buenos Aries has been under immense pressure to control the spiralling cost of food and earlier this year imposed a near-total ban on exports of beef. The result was that over the first half of this year exports declined by a quarter, despite the fact that during the first three months they were actually running ahead of the same period in 2007.

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