SLACK LAMB KILLING

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28554, 7 April 1958, Page 15

SLACK LAMB KILLING

Fewer Ewes For Export There has been no pre-Easter rush of lamb killings for export in Canterbury this season. Freezing works in fact report a slack period which is due in part to recent slow fattening conditions, with some degree of unthriftiness in lambs, and to the current low level of the export schedule, which is only a fraction of a penny above the floor price. On this account where lambs are doing at all well farmers may be inclined to carry them on, and awaiting hopefully some improvement in the market. The latest survey of the market information service of the New Zealand Meat Producers’ Board says that after the sharp fall through January lamb values on the United Kingdom market remained fairly steady from midFebruary through to the end of March. Off-take improved and there was a firmer tone to the market, but supplies in store remained heavy. At March 22, killings, of lambs and sheep in Canterbury so far this season reached an estimated total of a little more than 3m or about 100,000 fewer than at the corresponding stage of last season. This decline is due mainly to a marked falling off in the number of ewes killed for export A spokesman for one freezing company said ewe killings were down 30 per cent, in his organisation’s operations this season and a representative of another company estimated that export ewe slaughterings for the whole of Canterbury would be. lower by 60,000 carcases at this stage. This is also reflected in figures issued by the Meat Board for South Island kilings up to March 15. These show ewe killings for the island at 428,000 compared with 580,000 at this 'time last year and, of course, last season’s killings were very much lower than in the 1955-56 period. Ewe killings for the export year ending on September 30 last year totalled 758,000 carcases in the South Island compared with 1,043,000 in the previous year. Main Decline The main decline in this season’s ewe killings is believed to be in Canterbury, North Otago and Marlborough. Here good feed supplies are encouraging farmers to carry ewes through another winter and some, of course, may be holding off for favourable fat ewe prices in the winter. While ewe killings have been so much lower and lamb killings have lately been slow, over-all lamb killings in the South Island up to March 15 at about 5,300,000 are slightly ahead of last year. Individual freezing companies describe their lamb kills to date as being about on a par with last year to about 4£ per cent, higher. Higher seasonal kills were expected with.the estimated lamb crop in the South Island up by about 13 per cent, on last season. The average weight of lambs killed in the South Island so far this season is 33.181 b compared with 33.01 b last season.