Market Talk - Livestock kills at record level

It doesn't seem that long ago that Australia’s meat processing industry was on its knees only killing at 50-60 per cent capacity because of lack of workers (due the Covid lock downs etc.) and now we are at record slaughter levels across all categories.

The adult cattle kill for 2024-25 is estimated at 8.79 million head which will be the second highest since 1979 and that in turn means our export volumes continue to break all-time records.

Australian beef exports for June reached its highest ever monthly level at 134,593 tonnes up 4 per cent on May and up 27 per cent on June last year.

Total beef exports for the first 6 months of 2025 hit another record of 702,220 tonnes, up 17 per cent on last year and up 6 per cent on the previous record set in 2014 15 financial year.

The US remains our biggest market followed by China, Japan and Korea.

Grain-fed beef exports rose to 39,887 tonnes up 29 per cent compared with June last year and that is the highest volume on record.

Predictions from MLA are that these records will continue to be broken between now and the end of the year. All great news and now we wait to see where prices go in the next few months.

We are starting to see some improvement in cattle prices particularly in the southern part of the country where prices are considerably higher than in Queensland and as a result Victorian exporters are buying cattle out of Northern NSW and Queensland.

The Victorian average sale price for beef cows is 326c while in Queensland it is 275c/kg live weight.

Grown steer prices in Victoria are sitting at 416c while in NSW it is 383c and in Queensland 335c/kg.

It should be noted that the quality in Queensland is not at the same level as the southern states purely on breed.

In Tassie we are seeing better cattle prices and at Powranna on Tuesday we saw a number of year lings make over 400c/kg and it is a long time since we have seen those sort of prices.

Over-the-hooks prices are also at good levels with some expectation that there will be some improvement coming. Lamb and sheep sales continue to hum along with an Australian record of $435 per lamb (very heavy out of a Swan Hill feedlot) set at Bendigo on Monday and plenty of lambs quoted in the 1,100c to 1,200c/kg carcass weight range which is meaning that extra heavy pens at Bendigo made $330 to $390, heavy $286 to $335 and trade $250 to $310/head.

At Powranna we saw extra heavy pens make $342 to $352 (a record I think), heavy $240 to $314 and trade $204 to $260/head.

Mutton prices are also at very high levels with interstate markets quoted between 650c and 750c/ kg which is pretty similar to what we saw at Powranna on Tuesday.

Store cattle sale at Powranna next Thursday with 1,200 to 1,500 head expected, a great opportunity to buy cattle ready for the spring.