Rabobank 2026 Outlook: Geopolitics shapes global agriculture
The global agricultural landscape has entered a new phase where geopolitics – not only traditional market forces – will dictate agricultural trade flows, prices, and production decisions.
Rabobank’s senior agricultural analyst Emma Higgins says there is more pain to come before things start to settle down.
“The sheepmeat price schedule has come below the bottom of the five year price range, so it’s a bit more tricky there with some really tough market settings in the coming months.”
“They have had good lambing percentages and are now being warned about a possible dry summer.”
On the flip side, Higgins says there is some good news on the beef front with some stabilisation coming through in terms of farm gates prices in NZ. “In the last month these have started to track upwards due to the price of beef lean trimmings starting to lift in export markets.”
She adds that with milk production in NZ declining, it should mean that the schedule price will follow the normal season trend in the coming months.
