The downside to high prices

Just about anything with four legs and can bleat is making money for the farmer.

For many years sheep farmers have had to live with poor prices and this has been reflected in the investment going back into hill country farms. Now the tide has turned, seemingly for the better.

This year for instance, the topdressing industry is climbing on the back of the good lamb prices and the orders for fertiliser are coming in thick and fast. I suspect the field days people will have deals that are too good to be true – just waiting for farmers.

But is this all good news? The answer is yes and no – probably!

While farmers and their leaders argue these kinds of returns are necessary to keep them in business, others in the city are not so happy. The local butcher is now paying about $200 for a lamb from the works and he has to add onto that a margin to make a profit. A leg of lamb that would feed an average family costs close to $70 and for all, but the rich and famous, that's unaffordable.

The vast majority of consumers are turning away from lamb because it is too expensive – not because they don't like it. The worry is that in the long term they will lose the taste for something that New Zealand is famous for.

BLNZ chairman, Mike Petersen was right when he says lamb is becoming like bluff oysters – a luxury food for the wealthy.

The other problem for lamb is that there is a generation of people who don't know how to cook it. A year or so ago, I was asked by a young person to give her the recipe for roasting lamb.

So while it's good to enjoy high lamb now, perhaps greater thought and effort needs to be given by the meat industry to ensure that lamb remains an iconic food for all New Zealanders, not just the wealthy. — Peter Burke