NFU chief livestock adviser, John Royle, says it is time for retailers to promote different cuts of British lamb, and for processors to adapt and work with the likes of EBLEX to develop new markets.
He writes:
Ask any farmer how they judge the quality of the lambs they sell and they will talk to you about weight, fat and muscle cover.
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There is obviously a gap between what the farmer is selling and what your modern meat eater is looking for on the supermarket shelf. And then of course there is price to consider.
Nowadays the meat industry is increasingly switched on to the issue of carcass balance - how easy it is to sell different parts of an animal for people to eat.
Lamb is a classic case, where the legs and loin far outsell the rest of the animal, and make up a significant chunk of the value of the carcass. But what about the rest of it?
Retailers don’t want to take the risk of moving from a proven formula of a traditional selection of cuts and promotions. But I would argue that they must – and the rest of our industry needs to back them up when they choose to do this.
It is in the best interest of the whole supply chain. We need to see less short termism and a long term commitment from processors and retailers to support British producers, who are finding it increasingly difficult to get a reasonable return from lamb production. This is the message my team and the wider NFU are spreading at every opportunity.
While there still remains the question of how we stimulate demand for red meat, it is equally important to understand what consumers want and how different markets demand or accept different cuts.
Domestically, the reduction in time spent preparing food means that demand for prepared meals or meat with a short preparation and cooking time has increased at the expense of the more traditional cuts.
On the flip side, opening of more export markets presents an opportunity to sell those cuts that are less utilised in the UK, such as shoulder, neck or breast of lamb.
The issue with carcass balance, of course, needs to be addressed by the whole industry – not just retailers. The difficulty is that with red meat being comparably expensive, “adding value” can present issues in the short term. Processors need to train staff to perform different cuts, this adds costs and increases processing time. All of which are passed along the rest of the supply chain, adding cost to an already expensive product.
A livestock industry that is more focussed on a range of cuts, using the whole carcass and finding niche markets across a diverse export portfolio has to be the way forward.