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Berrybank Piggery op- erator Jock Charles started
Research from Grattin Institute shows that only 2 percent of all ag- riculture related emissions come from pork now, less than vegetable production and transformative for the Australian pork industry.
Vol 26. No. 1 January 2022 Australian Pork Newspaper PO Box 162 Wynnum 4178 Phone (07) 3286 1833 Email ben@collins.media
What does 2022 have in store
Executive General Manager
by PETER HAYDON
AUSTRALIAN Pork Limited chief executive officer Margo Andrae was taking a well- deserved break after a busy 2021, so I thought I’d take the opportunity to share a market up- date as we move into 2022.
percent over the July 2022 to June 2023 finan- cial year.
As we say farewell to a year of lockdowns and disruption both in city and regional areas, it is a good time to stop and put 2021 into perspective.
– when China declared African swine fever – but poultry is up around 12 million tonnes.
demand and supply re- balance.
This prediction around slower growth is based on potential stabilising of the sow herd – given the COVID-19 supply chain interruptions that may have tempered capability to execute growth plans.
In November at the del- egates forum, the APL team outlined a few assumptions we were making about the next couple of years.
According to Meat & Livestock Australia’s November projections, domestic beef produc- tion is likely to remain below the five-year av- erage for both 2022 and 2023, so beef prices may well stay high for the next couple of years.
The implications of this in the short term – between now and May – is that there could be fewer pigs around than the plentiful supply for the same period in 2021.
To reinforce how un- certain 2022 is, we are undertaking our plan- ning based on all Aus- tralian food channels being open in a ‘living with COVID world’ and also that Australia will continue to be ASF free.
We were clear that we do not know what is going to happen either domestically or globally in such uncertain times.
Though if that occurs, it is likely to be only a short-term situation.
As we said, we can’t know how these things will pan out, but these are APL’s planning as- sumptions looking ahead.
Having said that, we do need to contemplate what might happen, so we can anticipate at least those things on balance could occur.
The domestic lamb projections are looking to be slightly lower than the five-year average but higher than the last three years.
Obviously, the purpose of such exercises is to increase animal health, welfare and productivity.
We always welcome any opinion, so if you have any thoughts, let us know – any feedback is good feedback in this rapidly changing envi- ronment.
The global context is that the recovery of meat production volumes is gaining pace.
This has caused us to update the production survey information.
World pork production was still down 8 mil- lion tonnes versus 2018
It seems possible that lamb prices may fall as
Producers are now sug- gesting meat production may grow rapidly at 6
From there, growth may slow to 1 percent over the July 2023 to June 2024 year.
January is also a crit- ical time for APL to begin planning for the year ahead.
Beef and lamb pro- duction globally appear stable, so meat produc- tion volume has caught up and will probably match global demand by the end of 2022.
The biggest change in the outlook since the No- vember delegates forum however is that several producers have decided to depopulate and repop- ulate their herds.
This being the case, we are working through how we can fund additional investment in consumer demand options to try to ensure there is a moti- vated buyer for every pig.
A summary of APL current planning assumption.
Investment and effort by industry organisations and producers have seen pork production develop into the country’s second-lowest greenhouse gas agricultural source. Photo: Diego San
Pig waste turned into clean and green power
AUSTRALIAN pro- investing in waste-to- percent of the property’s
ducers are converting their animal waste into fuel for biogas power plants – turning ponds of poop into power.
energy systems nearly 30 years ago.
electricity, with additional benefits.
Not known for being clean or green, piggeries are rap- idly becoming greener than vegetables where climate change is concerned.
The bio-digester varies from the traditional ‘col- lected pig waste dumped into effluent ponds where it’s treated and broken down’ method in that it pumps the waste into a ma- chine that operates parallel to a pig’s stomach.
Investment and effort by industry organisations and producers have seen pork production develop into the country’s second-lowest greenhouse gas agricul- tural source.
Bacteria breaks the waste down into manure and produces methane, which is converted by turbine into heat and generates 90
“Seventy percent of odour from piggeries comes out of lagoons or ponds, so if you eliminate the ponds, which we’ve been able to do, then you’re only dealing with 30 percent.”
Bio-digesters are revolutionising biogas energy pro- duction for pork producers in Australia.
Australian Pork Limited reports that 80 percent of all farm emissions can be reduced by using biogas, with 16 percent of piggeries in Australia operating bio- digesters for green energy generation.
At the 20,000-pig prop- erty, Charles built a bio- digester.
“We are producing about the same as we use, but during the day when we’re running the feed mill and a few other things, we are pulling some power in from the grid, and then in the evening, we export power,” Mr Charles said.
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