An $850,000 contestable fund, established to drive further growth of the red-meat industry, has attracted 10 applications seeking nearly $1.6 million.
A plan has been launched with the aim of almost doubling the value of New Zealand's red meat sector earnings, and participants yesterday said it was a good start.
Consumers are starting to react negatively to the exceptionally high lamb prices, with one overseas customer telling Silver Fern Farms it will not use lamb in its ready-made meals from next year due to a lack of security of supply and price.
"It's not a freezing works any more, it's a food processing plant," Alliance Group Pukeuri plant manager Geoff Proctor said, describing North Otago's biggest industry.
September's storm has turned a potentially excellent year for southern sheep and beef farmers in to a pretty good one.
Wool marketer New Zealand Merino and meat company Silver Fern Farms are forming a joint venture to market and promote merino branded sheep meat and by-products.
Gains conservatively estimated at $360 million over five years have been identified from the first phase of a two-phase strategy aimed at making the red-meat sector more profitable and sustainable.
The way farmers sell livestock and the market behaviour of meat exporters have been identified in a new report as two areas hindering the performance of the red meat sector.
The pay cheques of the country's 22,000 meat workers will be thousands of dollars lighter this year with their seasonal jobs likely to be cut short by up to seven weeks because of falling sheep numbers.
Flooding in Australia and storms in the United States have combined to push beef prices to record levels.
Criticism of a trial allowing meat companies to carry out some meat inspection functions themselves was misguided and ignored the fact they had a vested interest in ensuring it was done properly, an industry body says.
Bankers remain committed to lending to sheep and beef farmers, but that support is tempered by concerns about the sector's long-term economic performance.
By next September, New Zealand's lamb kill is expected to have fallen six million in six years, raising questions about where it will all end. Data released by Beef and Lamb New Zealand (BLNZ)...
Alliance Group has weathered what chairman Owen Poole called a challenging year to September 30, to retain its solid financial position.
September's killer week of storms could cost the country's sheep and cattle farmers more than $100 million and wipe out up to 400 full-time seasonal jobs for southern meat workers.
As the meat industry ponders moves to improve its fortunes, Sharyn Price argues that a merger between the Alliance Group and Silver Fern Farms is not the best way to go.
In the wake of the Justice Bill Wilson issue, I feel I should disclose that I have a financial relationship with Alliance in that they send me money every time I send them lambs.
Meat industry cool storage company Polarcold is considering mothballing one of its two Dunedin plants and laying off up to half its staff in the wake of plummeting stock numbers - a problem further compounded by this week's storm.
The world's affluent people may be buying New Zealand's meat and wool, but a leading farmer is questioning why that is not making sheep farmers as wealthy as their dairying cousins.
Gains of more than $40 a lamb could flow back to farmers from the way the meat industry operated, according to a paper from Beef and Lamb New Zealand.