Australian Beef - A huge threat to U.K. farmers

katie59 you didn’t answer my question as to why you stated that animal food production uses less water than plant production. - all evidence( not just research) shows that raising animals for meat/ dairy uses many times more water than plant production. This is a huge environmental concern. Plus slurry and other waste products pollutes rivers and other waterways. You may think this is of little or no concern but many think the environment is worth protecting.

As far as Australian beef goes, we don't have to buy it always assuming though, that it isn't packaged here in which case they can claim (supermarkets) it is from the Uk so we won't know where it truly comes from unless we go to our local butcher.

nanna8

To digress slightly, do you still get a lot of Australian wine over there? Like the cattle industry, the wine industry is also facing Chinese cuts and a lot of the vineyards are in trouble because of it. They really don’t like being accused of starting Covid. Sorry to go off topic!

There is still a lot of Australian wine sold in the U.K. but probably less than 10 yrs ago, competition from South America and Europe is strong. Many traditional wine producers have changed their “style” of wine to varietal types rather than regional wines.
During the Covid lockdown the quantity of wine going past me on the supermarket till is amazing

vegansrock

Katie59 where did you go get the idea that animal agriculture uses less water than arable? An Australian research shows that 20 times more water is required to produce animal products compared to plant products - so it is worthy of consideration.

So the rivers are being pumped dry to water animals!.
Vegan you should not seize on “research” just because it suits your cause, many of the reports are highly biased.

It’s not the volume of the trade that is of concern to U.K. farmers it’s the quality issue and the precedent set , opening the doors to similar deals with far eastern countries with lower standards and the environmental and economic cost of that.

To digress slightly, do you still get a lot of Australian wine over there? Like the cattle industry, the wine industry is also facing Chinese cuts and a lot of the vineyards are in trouble because of it. They really don’t like being accused of starting Covid. Sorry to go off topic!

Kali2

As Emily Thornberry rightly says- if such a terrible deal, doing so much damage to our farmers, had been forced upon us by the EU- Brexiters would have totally lost it and gone out of their mind.

True.

That is Thornberry's view

Here are some facts:

Currently:

In 2019-20, trade in goods and services between Australia and the UK was valued at £20.1bn, and both sides are hoping to expand this amount considerably.

Trade in meat between the two countries is small, with 0.15% of all Australian beef exports going to the UK and 14% of sheep meat imports to the UK coming from Australia.

BBC News

Katie59 where did you go get the idea that animal agriculture uses less water than arable? An Australian research shows that 20 times more water is required to produce animal products compared to plant products - so it is worthy of consideration.

As Emily Thornberry rightly says- if such a terrible deal, doing so much damage to our farmers, had been forced upon us by the EU- Brexiters would have totally lost it and gone out of their mind.

True.

Yes, I'd heard about the Murray/Darling rivers, an extremely worrying situation.

They wanted to build a pipeline down from NQ I believe.

There has been good rainfall after the droughts but so much water is wasted when there is rainfall.

The Darling River in Australia is actually pumped dry for irrigation to produce crops for export and the fish die - that is those that are not killed by pollution

We can pipe oil and gas across continents but seemingly not water.
Strange.

Sydney has higher average rainfall than London but they do not conserve water efficiently there, although other areas of Australia do.

“What about the water use needed to raise that many animals in a hot climate?”

Growing crops in hot climates uses a hell of a lot more water than animals do, so that’s a red herring completely, whatever we do we are going to be short of water, the only way to solve that is a smaller global population.

Baggs - nail on the head! Since my son became a vegan, I've noticed that most of the ingredients he uses come from afar and suggested (tongue in cheek) that he could perhaps live on what he can grow in his own quite sizeable garden! Suggestion not well received!

PS Just got a delivery from a wholefoods online set up of Black Beans (China), Black Beluga lentils (USA), dried dates (Tunisia), and ground coriander (Bulgaria). Our local shops don't have these things.

Do you know, I think I'm going to start a list of the places the food we buy comes from, just out of interest. Anyone else want to join in? I think I'd better start another thread.

When we shopped at Waitrose I hardly ever saw British lamb; it was nearly always from New Zealand. Did people complain about that?

I think there are too many sheep and deer in Britain anyway. With the numbers we have it's very difficult to regenerate natural forest. I don't include tree planting in my definition of regenerating native forest. The proper way to do it is to fence off areas from sheep and deer and allow Nature to do its thing. Takes longer but it's far far better way of encouraging biodiversity by natural progression.

VR not only water for cattle but for Australian sugar which will be included in their exports to us? Apparently it needs 3 times as much water to grow as does U.K. sugar beet.

This trade deal is not just about British farmers though it’s about pharmaceuticals, industrial manufacturing etc. which are in the proposed agreement and seem to be taking precedence. The Aussies are digging their feet in that you can’t have one without the other. Why not? We need to dig our feet in not sacrifice our farmers. It’s been argued only a small percentage of meat comes here - well that isn’t necessarily going to continue. When all tariffs and quotas are removed in next 15 years they can and no doubt will flood our market. In return our beef farmers will be able to export high quality sirloin to them according to one conservative MP. Big deal!

What about the water use needed to raise that many animals in a hot climate?

Not so simple for meat surely. The environmental cost would have to include refrigeration.

I know it is counterintuitive but long distance shipping contributes considerably less to the environment than trucking or air even though the quantity of goods is much greater.
Every year our business has to do an ISO report on our emissions including shipping. We are in NZ and we send to Australia and the USA the difference in transportation emissions between the two countries from port to port is small but if the product is shipped across the States that is where the emissions get much higher. So the argument of long distance is a matter of perception.
Just so you know.

Katie59

I just remember the ham and side of bacon hanging from the hooks in the parlour at grandads place, it wasnt the nice lean bacon we have these days, at least 50% fat. Villagers keeping a pig didn’t happen much after WW2 and food rationing

Do you remember that scene from All Creatures Great and Small where a grateful farmer's wife offered James (Christopher Timothy) a bacon breakfast and it was just fat?

I just remember the ham and side of bacon hanging from the hooks in the parlour at grandads place, it wasnt the nice lean bacon we have these days, at least 50% fat. Villagers keeping a pig didn’t happen much after WW2 and food rationing

but seeing cows with calves roaming freely is still not a common sight in most parts of UK


Weather permitting they do calve outdoors but this May has been unusually cold.
It may be safer for them to calve indoors this year and stay there for a week or so until they go out.

Outwintering is not always possible. Bad weather, winds, mud, snow, just damp and cold. Animal welfare is a priority.
This may explain why:
www.nadis.org.uk/disease-a-z/cattle/out-wintering-of-cattle/

MawBe

^And yes, well done the UK for rosy veal- but seeing cows with calves roaming freely is still not a common sight in most parts of UK^
I think it’s called rose veal actually and as for cows with calf at foot , shall we agree to differ on that?
Perhaps not in your part of the Dales?

Ah thanks- I don't live in the Dales btw.

Callistemon

She probably gave it a name and talked to it!
I doubt many of them were fed on Michelin* food although I do know of some pigs which were.

Ps probably lots of peelings turned into swill from the veg from her kitchen garden, which, of course would have been what we now call organic.