Sheep prices plunge as farmers flood market

afr.com:

A projected 23 per cent increase in Australia’s sheep flock since the last drought in 2020 has created a glut that has sent prices into free fall, as farmers scramble to sell before hot weather hits this summer.

Australia’s total sheep flock and breeding ewe numbers are forecast to hit 78.8 million in 2023, the highest level since 2007, after three straight years of above-average rainfall, according to a July update from Meat & Livestock Australia.

Hit by weak export demand and the collapse of farmer-to-farmer trade – when farmers sell sheep to each other – producers who built up flocks during three rainy years are sending them to market in droves as they face the prospect of hotter and drier weather conditions. Meat & Livestock Australia data shows cattle prices broadly down almost 50 per cent on last year and sheep prices down 37 per cent.

Woodanilling sheep producer Bindi Murray fears for the future of the industry in WA. Trevor Collens

In Western Australia, the collapse in prices has been exacerbated by the Albanese government’s move to shut down sheep shipments to the Middle East – trade important to a state that doesn’t have a big domestic market for lamb compared with NSW or Victoria. Prices for some WA producers have dropped to as little as $1 or $2 a head.

The situation for WA livestock producers is a far cry from 2020 when, at the end of the east coast drought, they cashed in on high prices being paid by farmers on the other side of the country looking to restock. Almost 2 million sheep were trucked out of WA in 2020, along with big numbers of cattle, as east coast producers bred up on the back of rain.

But with talk for months about an El Nino weather pattern bringing drier conditions, and scars from the last