Korea is the largest per capita consumer of beef in Asia and the third most valuable beef export market for Australia.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
That position is expected to be cemented as Korea becomes increasingly reliant on imported product to fill the domestic production shortfall.
Those insights are among several from Meat & Livestock Australia’s (MLA) new report “The Korean beef market: Insights and prospects from an Australian perspective” that was released this month.
The report found that short-term tight Korean beef supplies, high prices and enthusiastic buying from the Korean trade had lifted Australian beef exports to Korea to a record 180,000 tonnes shipped weight (swt) in 2016, worth an estimated A$1.36 billion.
MLA global market analyst Tim Ryan, who co-authored the report with fellow analyst Adam Cheetham, said while a number of short-term factors would impact the Korean imported beef market in 2017, the long-term prospects for Australian beef exports to Korea were positive.
But Mr Ryan said Australian beef production was forecast to contract in 2017 when US production and competition was on the rise. Another constraining factor was the recent recovery of the Korean Hanwoo beef herd from a cyclical trough, with it registering the first year-on-year growth since 2013. Local beef production is expected to peak at almost 355,000 tonnes cwt by 2026, before receding towards 2030.
“Underpinned by economic growth and tariff reductions on imported product, per capita beef consumption is forecast to grow from 15.5 kilogram carcase weight equivalent (cwe) in 2016 to 17.2kg cwe in 2030,” Mr Ryan said.
“If Australia is able to defend existing market share, this will place beef exports to Korea at 180,000-200,000 tonnes shipped weight (swt) over the next decade but with prospects of 230,000 tonnes swt by 2030 – all of which would still exceed the record 2016 volume,” he said.
To offset pressure from US beef, MLA has been working with exporters, distributors and Korean retailers to grow sales of Australian beef through a series of ‘True Aussie’ promotional campaigns. The campaigns include working closely with Korean retailers, Homeplus and E-Mart Traders.
