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The head of an international research group that tracks meat imports and exports sees a world-wide decline in beef consumption over the next eight years, but points to a key US market as an exception. "Between 1997 and 2007, we forecast declines in per-capita beef consumption in almost all the traditional high level beef consumers," said Alan E. Gordon, president of Gordon International Research Associates. "Per capita consumption growth is coming from Japan and China." Speaking at the International Livestock Congress this year, he noted that while there is a good image of beef in Japan, there is small overall meat consumption due to high seafood consumption. Gordon predicted that US beef consumption will be down from 43.8 kg per person in 1997 to 38.9 kg per person in 2007. The predicted drops in other nations include the EU with a drop from 18.9 to 17.8 kg per person; Brazil, 37 to 33.8; Argentina, 54.2 to 49.7, and Australia with a drop of 40.3 kg per person to 36.3. Japan, however, should have an increase, he said, of from 12.2 to 15.6 kg per person. China, too, should show an increase of 3.4 to 5.9. "The per capita gain, almost 500,000 tons in volume, for Japan is very good news for exporters as Japan is not really able to economically increase its beef production," Gordon said. There are a number of components in the world beef trade, Gordon said. There is the live trade with Canada and Mexico shipping cattle to the US. Ireland ships cattle to the Middle East. Australia ships to Southeast Asia and the Middle East. The main volume of beef, however, is fresh meat, bone-in and boneless, chilled and frozen. Most of the processed meat comes from Brazil and Argentina. There are two main trades, the Pacific and Atlantic. In the Pacific, Australia and New Zealand ship mainly hindquarters to Japan and mainly forequarters to the US. The US and Canada export mainly grainfed hindquarters to Japan and Korea. In the Atlantic, Argentina, Uruguay, and Brazil ship fresh and processed beef to Europe and some fresh to Middle East. The EU exports fresh beef to the Middle East and Russia. "The blurrings between these trades have been small, and we expect them to remain so," Gordon said. There are small quotas for Uruguay and Argentina in fresh beef into the US to mark their FMD free status, and there should not be much change, Gordon said. There are some efforts by Australia to move into the Middle East market and marginally into the EU. In theory, the EU could try to break into the Japanese market, but there would be doubts on quality in competition with top quality US grainfed and Australian grain and grassfed beef, Gordon said. "There are also considerable differences in prices obtained on different trade axes," Gordon said. The three major world exporters in 1997 (excluding live trade) were Australia with 1.19 million tons, the EU with 975 million tons and the US with 970 million tons. That represents 59 percent of world trade. The US only exports eight percent of its production and is highly focused on Japan. US export beef is unsubsidized. The EU, which is subsidized, exports about 12 percent of its production and exports are essentially a removal of surplus. Australia exports about 64 percent of its production, and its beef exports are of major significance to its economy. They are unsubsidized. The top three major importers, excluding live cattle, represented half of the world's imports in 1997. They are the US with 21 percent of the world's imports, Japan with 18.6 percent and Russia with 10.7 percent. Each country is very different, Gordon noted. The US has a structural shortage of forequarter due to the hamburger predilection which shows few signs of lessening. Japan is a quality market. Russia's is low price and volatile market for meat and processed meat. "We see the top three importers in 1997 maintaining their hierarchy and percentage importance in 2007, with the usual caveats about Russia," Gordon said. While various meat and livestock groups keep talking about science-based import and export rules and regulations, Gordon sadly noted that politics plays a part, and always has, in the importation and exportation of goods. This will change very little in the future, he said. There are, Gordon said, a variety of lobbying positions varying from the protectionist of the EU and Japan to the extreme liberalization of the CAIRNS Group. "The USA is in between and in our opinion takes a somewhat opportunistic position depending on its interests which differ for each of the four meats," Gordon said. "The climate of low world prices in agriculture is not conclusive to further liberalization and there are very big differences in views of the role of agriculture between the EU and the USA." More of the same can be anticipated, he said, with further reductions in subsidy volumes, further reductions in tariffs, tightening of the rules although the WTO has to tread carefully on issues such as bananas and hormones in beef. The result will be freer trade, but not free trade, Gordon said. |
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