Australia - The dollar and beef exports

  THE Australian dollar's historic eclipse of the US greenback this week has highlighted the dramatic changes being seen in the international grinding meat trade this year caused by currency movements. The Australian dollar continued its upwards spiral, hitting US100.2c during trading on Tuesday.Driven squarely by currency, Australia's manufacturing beef shipments to the US for the month of October totalled just 8951 tonnes. That's the lowest figure for any month since January 1996, and a 45pc slide on the same month last year, as exporters seek customers in other parts of the world less exposed to currency changes.Russia, on the other hand, has seen a dramatic five-fold increase in Australian grinding beef imports over the same 12-month cycle.So significant is the currency impact that some analysts are suggesting that after 40 years dominating Australia's grinding meat price trends, the US may no longer provide the price-setting role for Aust-ralian 90CL manufacturing product.Instead those price signals may now be set by a basket of "second-tier" markets, including Russia, Indonesia and others.Recent reports out of the US illustrate just how profound the currency impact has been.US Cattle Buyers Weekly publisher, Steve Kay, reports a record-wide price premium has emerged for imported lean (90CL) beef over US domestic 90CL beef, causing headaches for importers and some US end-users.While total beef imports to the US for the year to date are down only 5pc on the same period last year, imports from Australia (predominantly frozen 90CL) are down 27pc, and from New Zealand, down 6pc.So far this year, Australia has filled only 40pc of its tariff-free US quota of 379,0000t, sliding to second place behind Canada as the largest outside supplier to the US...

Source: farmonline.com.au

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