U.K. Still Main Lamb Market

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31681, 17 May 1968, Page 1

U.K. Still Main Lamb Market

The United Kingdom would be the main market for New Zealand lamb in the foreseeable future, the general manager of the New Zealand Refrigerating Company (Mr W. M. Cleland) said yesterday. Addressing a group from the Lincoln farmers’ conference which visited his company’s works at Islington, he estimated that the United Kingdom market could increase by 2j to 5 per cent a year. Canada and the United States would take more lamb, provided political factors in the United States did not intervene. There was also an expanding market in Greece, but this was restricted to the light-weight lean lambs, and was subject to strong competition from the Argentine. Mr Cleland said there was some demand in European countries, but marketers had not made as much progress

as had been hoped. This was largely because of the operation of tariffs and quotas in Common Market countries. Market In Japan Mr Cleland said Japan had a vast expanding population, quickly becoming Westernised and concentrating on industrial development. The Japanese standard of living was rising 10 to 15 per cent a year. The Japanese were short of animal protein and their own agricultural production was shrinking. The Japanese, however, were not lamb eaters, and the best prospects for marketing this class of meat appeared to be in concentrating on the youth of the country through school lunch programmes and cooking schools. Mr Cleland said one had to appreciate that the average Japanese home had no Western style cooking facilities, and meat was rarely prepared on the bone.

Explaining why the Japanese had taken so much ewe mutton from New Zealand, rather than lamb, he said the boned meat was thinly sliced

and served with sauces and vegetables. It was very hard to tell the difference between lamb and mutton when it was prepared in this way, so there was little point in the Japanese paying a premium for lamb. The Japanese, Mr Cleland said, would take ewe mutton from New Zealand for a long time. It provided them with the protein they required, and at the right price. Of the ewe mutton that Japan had been buying in recent years, Mr Cleland said: “Frankly, I don’t know what we would have done with it, if they hadn’t taken it.” Favours Beef Mr Cleland said that if New Zealand was going to increase its meat production, he hoped it would be by way of beef. The pattern of trade for prime beef was possibly more diversified than for other meat products. He predicted that a good market could develop in Japan. Because of falling domestic production, quotas on imported beef could be relaxed, although this was a Govern-

ment to Government matter. He said he was sure, however, that if the quotas were relaxed, New Zealand would have a good market for beef in Japan sometime.