September may have brought essential rain to build grass covers and get winter root crops growing to service demand for an anticipated bumper store lamb season.

National figures from Defra and AHDB suggest many lambs remain on farms after creep prices and dry weather slammed the breaks on lamb growth rates.

High lamb production was forecast in the AHDB summer outlook, which pegged flock expansion at 3% this year, and a prime lamb uplift of 2% in the second half of the year.

June and July slaughter figures are back 6% on the year, to 188,690, after being 14% up on the year from March to May.

August slaughter figures are still to be finalised, but liveweight throughputs are back 12.4% on the year, at 290,068 for the four weeks in August. Deadweight surveys suggest processors have had 9% fewer lambs on the year for the same period, at 169,188 head.

Store sales through markets in July and August have totalled 314,293 head, which is 14.5% back on the year. Average prices have levelled at £79, about £1.50 a head up on last year.

by Michael Priestley /  Farmers Weekly

Future Meat Technologies of Rehovot, Israel, has produced its first cultivated lamb. The lab-made product is said to look, cook and taste like conventional ground lamb meat ready to make into burgers, kebabs, and more.

Future Meat’s development of cultivated lamb started in 2019 with fibroblast cells isolated from Awassi sheep, generating two independent ovine cell lines that divide indefinitely.

This industry-first cultivated lamb is not genetically modified. Future Meat CEO Nicole Johnson-Hoffman says the product is cost-effective, sustainable and scalable, without harming a single animal in the process.

“Since lamb has a uniquely distinct flavour, it is very clear if a cultivated substitute is on or off the mark,” said Future Meat General Manager Michael Lenahan.

“The reason Future Meat’s cultivated lamb is indistinguishable from conventional lamb is because it is, first and foremost, real meat. It sizzles, sears and tastes just like people expect—it’s amazing.”

The technology was developed in the lab of Prof. Yaakov Nahmias at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Nahmias is the company’s president and chief scientific officer.

The company did not comment on when the cultivated lamb is expected to hit the market. Meanwhile, it is preparing to enter the US food-service market with cultivated lamb and chicken made in a new facility to be built in the United States next year.

By Abigail Klein Leichman / Israel21c.org

The UK’s many native sheep breeds have been put in the spotlight after US meat processors arrived in the country and took part in a mutton taste test.

The British Heritage Sheep scheme and the AHDB championed the unique flavour brought to the table by native sheep breeds at the NSA Sheep 2022 event.

There, a taste test was conducted by a group of US meat processors, who were in the UK.

It encompassed three breeds, the Herdwick, Portland and Shropshire, which were selected due to their different ancestry.

Britain has the largest number of native sheep breeds of any country in the world – over 60.

The British Heritage Sheep scheme aims to commercialise the UK’s historic breeds by making an asset out of diversity, and offering a choice to consumers.

The scheme is based on an ABC of three key pieces of information for the consumer – age, breed and countryside.

Following the taste test, NSA chief executive, Phil Stocker explained that sheep meat was one of the last undifferentiated foods in mainstream markets.

“Not all sheep meat tastes the same, particularly as sheep get older producing hogget and mutton, the main factors affecting the flavour are the age of the animal and its breed.

“To some extent what the animal eats will also affect its flavour – for example, a mountain sheep eats predominantly wild herbs and grasses, giving the meat a distinctive eating experience, highly prized in past generations.”

By Farming UK

Response comes after Chinese media reports imports could be suspended over foot-and-mouth disease concerns.

Australia and New Zealand have said shipments of meat to China are clearing as normal despite Chinese media reports of a ban on imports from both countries.

The Australian Financial Review newspaper said one Chinese media outlet had reported that agricultural imports, particularly meat, from Australia and New Zealand may be suspended due to concerns about foot-and-mouth disease.

“We are aware of rumours. The Australian Embassy in Beijing has been in contact with China Customs and no formal notification has been issued,” a spokesperson at the Australian agricultural department said in an emailed statement on Tuesday.

Steve Ainsworth, market access director at the New Zealand Ministry for Primary Industries, said exports were continuing as normal.

“We’ve made enquiries with Chinese authorities, including through our Embassy staff in China. These enquiries confirm that New Zealand products are continuing to be cleared through the border,” he said in a statement.

Neither Australia nor New Zealand has reported a case of foot-and-mouth disease among livestock. But both nations are taking extra biosecurity precautions after the animal virus was found in the popular Indonesian holiday destination of Bali.

AlJazeera / Reuters

The annual week-long celebration of UK lamb will be returning next month for an eighth year, with sheep producers set to shine a light on the sustainability of their sector.

Love Lamb Week, running from 1-7 September, aims to remind consumers of the taste and quality that UK lamb brings to the dinner table.

The popular initiative will focus on how lamb is ‘naturally delicious’ and due to the country’s climate and landscape, with plenty of rainfall and grass, the UK is an ideal place to produce lamb sustainably.

As in previous years, the industry-wide initiative is supported by groups such as AHDB, Hybu Cig Cymru (Meat Promotion Wales), Quality Meat Scotland and LMC in Northern Ireland, among others.

AHDB Head of Marketing, Carrie McDermid said: “We are delighted to be supporting Love Lamb Week for an eighth year.

“It provides us all with the opportunity to celebrate UK lamb, a family favourite due to its superior taste and quality and shine a light on our world-class food and farming standards.

by Farming UK / AHDB

Welsh farmers’ leaders have criticised the UK Government’s new trade deal with New Zealand and says ministers have failed “to fight for the interests of our farmers”.

The government is also accused of blocking scrutiny of the deal which is currently awaiting MP’s approval.

Comparing the UK’s deal with a recently agreed pact between the EU and New Zealand, the Farmers’ Union of Wales says the import quota for sheep meat in year one of the agreement signed by the UK is more than forty times higher per head of population in the UK compared with the European Union agreement.

The EU-New Zealand trade deal, recently agreed in principle, would allow an additional 5,429 tonnes of sheep meat to be imported duty-free into the EU in year one of the agreement, whilst the equivalent figure for the UK in the deal announced in February this year is 35,000 tonnes.

“The UK increase in duty free quota for New Zealand sheep meat would be almost six and a half times higher in year one than what has been negotiated by the EU,” said FUW President Glyn Roberts.

“However, when you take account of the fact that the population of the EU is nearly seven times higher than that of the UK, the increase per consumer is 43 times higher in the UK than in the EU.”

Mr Roberts said that another way of looking at the figure was that the EU had fought forty times harder for its sheep industry than the UK during its trade negotiations with New Zealand.

Nation Cymru

Farmers are expressing their deep concerns following the signing of a free trade deal between the UK and New Zealand on Monday (February 28).

Hailed by the government as a deal that will slash red tape for companies exporting their goods, British farmers have pointed out the UK market will be flooded with imported food, produced at lower standards.

By Lisa Young / South West Farmer

by Farming UK

by Hannah Clarke / AHDB

Dunbia has applied for planning permission for a new beef chilling unit and other modernisation works on its site at Walton Summit to add to the £20m it has already spent there in the past two years.

By Brian Ellis / Lancashire Evening Post