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The 2019 lamb crop report released this week by Beef and Lamb New Zealand estimates the number of lambs tailed in spring 2019 (autumn 2019 in the northern hemisphere) decreased by 2.4% or a sizeable 552,000 head on the year previous to reach 22.7m head.
New Zealand sheep farmers tail-dock their lambs a few weeks post-lambing and this is where the count originates from.
The report points to regional differences, but summarises the main drivers as being a lower lambing percentage and fewer ewes and ewe hoggets mated. The average lambing percentage was recorded at 127.1%, which is a reduction of 1.5% on 2018.
Declines
The number of breeding ewe recorded on farms on 1 July 2019 reduced 1.1% on the levels recorded 12 months previous to 17m head. The reports says most regions experienced declines in breeding ewe numbers, with buoyant farmgate prices encouraging farmers to cull any ewes experiencing any faults.
Strong farmgate prices are likely to be encouraging higher drafting of sheep for slaughter
The number of lambs born to ewe hoggets totalled 1.18m head. This is equivalent to 5.5% of total lamb numbers and is a reduction of 3.9% on spring 2018.
Again, strong farmgate prices are likely to be encouraging higher drafting of sheep for slaughter, while the effects of drought are still evident in some areas.
Lower processing predicted
The knock-on effects of a smaller spring lamb crop is the availability of lamb for export is estimated to decrease 2.7% to 18.26m head. This will be compensated somewhat by estimates that the number of adult sheep processed is likely to increase 9.2% or from 3.2m head to 3.7m head.
Again, higher prices are predicted to continue to contribute to higher drafting of adult sheep. There is also a renewed focus in New Zealand on environmental concerns, with afforestation being promoted and competing once again with land historically farmed by sheep.
The longer-term consequences are further contraction in the New Zealand flock and tighter availability of sheepmeat availability for export. This could have some positive connotations for EU farmers, with lower volumes of NZ sheepmeat in the market.
For the first time ever, New Zealand exported more sheepmeat to China than the EU. Export figures show New Zealand failing to fill 50% of its tariff-free EU quota of about 227,000t.
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