Farmers sought for Red Meat conference

The conference will be held in Auckland on July 8 and is jointly organised by the Meat Industry Association and Beef + Lamb NZ.

With the newly formed Meat Industry Excellence (MIE) pushing for merging co-ops, Silver Fern Farms and Alliance in a bid to lift returns, organisers hope more farmers will attend.

Meat Industry Association chief executive Tim Ritchie says the proposed merger of meat co-ops will not be "a specific presentation topic" at the conference.

"I am not aware whether anyone from MIE will attend, but registrations have only just opened," he told Rural News.
"We would of course welcome increasing farmer attendance at the conference and together with Beef + Lamb we will be promoting that in the month ahead."

The conference programme will again be centred on presentations relevant to the three key themes of the Red Meat Sector Strategy, released two years ago: coordinated in-market behaviour, efficient and aligned procurement and sector best practice.

Visiting and New Zealand speakers will take part. They include UK meat sector consultant Richard Brown, ANZ rural economist Con Williams, Sealord chief executive Graham Stuart and food marketing expert Professor David Hughes.

On MIE'S push for a mega meat processor, Ritchie says the MIA doesn't have a position on any structural change in the sector. "That is essentially a proprietary matter for our members and their shareholder," he says.

The MIA is a voluntary trade association of processors, marketers and exporters.

For the year ending June 2012, the meat industry earned export revenue of $6.1 billion.

MIA member companies operate 60 processing plants, slaughtering and processing 19 million lambs, 4.3 million sheep and 3.9 million cattle and calves each year.