How UK's £800m Net Quarterly Imports Of Meat Are Carved Up
UK - The reforms of the Common Agricultural Policy, which became operational on 1 January 2005, were widely forecast to lead to a reduction in the production of many commodities.Figures just released by Revenue and Customs confirm those predictions, with the value of beef imports rising in the first quarter of 2007 by 4 per cent while the volume increased by 6 per cent. This suggests that the increased imports were low value cuts and that this trend may have been partly responsible for the less than satisfactory returns for prime cattle.
The total value of beef imported in the first three months of 2007 was £144.8 million, up from £138.9m in the same period a year earlier.
The fine detail reveals that in the first quarter of this year the UK imported 58,351 tonnes of beef, which is an increase of more than 3,000 tonnes on the equivalent period of 2006. Over 45,000 tonnes of this beef came from EU countries, with the Republic of Ireland being by far the largest supplier at just short of 37,000 tonnes. This represents an increase of 1,500 tonnes, but is still less than some industry analysts had forecast.
Source: Scotsman