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Rural Crime Conference: The Way Forward
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The international conference on rural crime was recently hosted by the UNISA College of law in collaboration with the Red Meat Producers' Organisation (RPO), African Federation of Agriculture South Africa (AFASA), Transvaal Agricultural Union of South Africa (TAU SA) and Agri SA with the main objective to address the rural crimes that affect agriculture.
Four critical issues to be addressed as a priority were identified
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Chinese delegation visit South Africa
The China meat association’s importer and exporter branch will visit South Africa from 4 to 7 November 2017.
South Africa and China earlier this year reached agreements on the final details of a protocol to allow South Africa to begin with beef exports to China.
The delegation will visit various large scale meat producers, cattle farms, slaughterhouses and a meat processing company. The Red Meat Industry Forum (RMIF) and the Association of Meat Importers and Exporters (AMIE) will also be consulted during the visit.
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Co-operation between DAFF and RMIF to be improved
The Red Meat Industry Forum (RMIF) Management Committee and the acting Director-general of the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Dr Mooketsa Ramasodi, at a meeting resolved that both parties has to find ways to improve their working relationship, to improve information sharing and decision making and to work more integrated and in tandem.
The following issues were inter alia discussed
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Parasite problems to increase
As soon as there is an increase in rainfall, parasite problems will increase, according to the monthly report on livestock disease trends as informally reported by veterinarians belonging to the Ruminant Veterinary Association of South Africa (RuVASA), a group of the South African Veterinary Association.
Make sure to assess the blue tick resistance status on your farm before buying tickicides. Your veterinarian will be able to collect engorged blue ticks to be tested for resistance. Tick numbers will increase after rains.
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Weaner price will remain high
It is expected that weaner as well as carcass prices will remain high but will move sideways during the short‐term due to still limited supply, there might be marginal increases in the carcass price towards the end of the year as the festive season approaches, according to a feedlot analysis and outlook published by AMT.
The South African feedlot industry collectively markets close to 80% of total beef production in South Africa. During December 2015 there were 531 662 animals on feed while the highest number recorded was 668 082 during Feb 2015 (SAFA, 2017).
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Perspective
Genotype-environment interaction in reproductive performance of the Nguni.
In the October Newsletter I reported on results showing that the performance of the Nguni differs in different biomes or grazing areas. In a wider context this should be expected as in the 1200 year period of evolvement and settlement of Sanga ecotypes in different regions of the African continent, different Nguni ecotypes but with a common genetic background would have settled in South Africa, Mozambique, Swaziland, Namibia and Zimbabwe.
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Draft LITS document published
The Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF) has published a draft document on a livestock identification and traceability system (LITS) in South Africa.
It is recommended that the norms and standards of a LITS-system based on international standard requirements and the existing national animal identification system be defined and adopted; that an exchange platform database be built or upgraded; that a suitable implementation authority be established; and that pilot priority LITS-projects and projects thereafter adjust the requirements before full implementation takes place.
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Scientists rewarded
Red Meat Research and Development SA (RMRD-SA) recently awarded their scientists at a prestigious event in Pretoria.
Scientists were nominated in four categories
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JSE livestock futures contract announced
JSE announced the addition of the lamb futures contracts to its livestock futures product offering.
Producers can use it to protect themselves against adverse price movements with a JSE beef and lamb carcass futures contract.
To find out more, contact the JSE Commodity Derivatives team on
011 520 7039 | commodities@jse.co.za
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Statutory levy increases
The Statutory Levy will increase on 1 November 2017 as stipulated in Government Gazette nr. 38199 of 11 November 2014.
The following functions are funded with the Statutory Levy: consumer assurance, consumer communication and education, transformation and development, red meat research and development, industry liaison, production development, compliance to legislation and administration.
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Global beef production is high
Internationally, higher expected global beef production in 2018 may weigh on prices, according to ABSA Agri Trends.
Domestically, it is in line with seasonal trends for prices to follow an increasing trend through August until after the festive season, because we have entered warmer conditions. It is a norm for producers to hold their animals back during the rainy season, with the hope that the rains will improve grazing conditions. The retention of animals during the rainy season leads to an even smaller herd.
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Lamb prices are high in global market
Internationally, lamb prices are high (due to low global inventories), which may start to weigh on consumer demand, according to ABSA Agri Trends.
Locally, lamb and mutton prices have recorded some declines over the past two months, after having increased to record levels in the past weeks. Consumer resistance may have contributed to the declines. Moving forward, prices may gain support from as the warmer temperatures are supportive to outdoor grilling.
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cooking-with-lamb.com
For everything lamb and mutton and more…
Google recently officially reclaimed its spot as the top source of referral traffic since Facebook implemented some major algorithm changes. This simply means advertisers need to start giving their websites more attention again.
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