Stephen Dodsworth on booming beef trade.聽
The current beef boom聽knows no bounds.
The extraordinary live ring has lately been at its brilliant聽best, no matter the age,聽weight or farm assured status, week聽by week we see cattle prices enter uncharted waters.
So why is the beef price at an all-time high?
On home soil we could blame the聽declining hill cow numbers, the cost聽of production forcing suckler herds聽to abandon ship or even the now聽commonplace sexed semen in our聽dairy sector, but I believe the problem is worldwide.
Despite the influx of plant-based聽celebrities on our screens, what we聽actually have is a growing protein-hungry population.
Aside from聽the tofu, soya, almond, avocado obsessed minority, we live in a world聽where people need reasonably priced聽and sustainable sources of protein,聽zinc, iron and vitamin B12 - guess聽what? The original source is the best.聽
So, the Great British beef farmer is聽enjoying a purple patch and a very聽well deserved one at that.
Our beef farmers have earned this, for all those bad calvings and hard winters, let alone the scars left by foot-and mouth and BSE.
What next? Cow numbers take a聽long time to expand and therefore in聽the short-term we will surely see聽more ground-breaking prices.
If聽things do not change from the top, we聽may see expensive beef as the new聽normal, it is fast becoming a delicacy.
Will the wise folk of Westminster聽even realise that without food security聽we are in a deep hole?
Subsidies must be reinvented, rewritten and reflect production levels, without this our political parties inevitably face a vote from a very聽hungry nation and, if they are anything like me, I am rather angry
when I am hungry.聽
Stephen Dodsworth
Stephen Dodsworth is a fieldsperson聽at Darlington Farmers Auction聽Mart. Call 01325 464 529, or email聽[email protected]
