FOR Victorian agency Peter Wilson Livestock, this year's forward-price contracts for lamb spell opportunity and income safety.
The company has promoted the contracts to clients and is on track to have 10,000 head booked up, according to agent Nathan Everinghan.
When buying store lambs at Wagga Wagga, NSW, this month, Mr Everinghan said the chance to make a guaranteed margin from feeding livestock was unusual.
"We've certainly advised our clients to consider the contracts because they can go in with full confidence knowing what they will get at the other end which is very rare," he said.
"We'll probably put out 10,000 as we just think it is a very good opportunity."
Peter Wilson Livestock is based at Cobram, Victoria, which is also the home of Swift's export lamb abattoir and the obvious place for the contracted lambs to save on transport costs.Mr Everinghan paid from $40 to $65 for store lambs at Wagga Wagga and said the lambs would be finished in a number of ways.
The smaller and younger lambs would be backgrounded on properties that have access to underground water and can irrigate crops such as millet. They wouldn't be sold until late winter.
The older and heavier lambs would be finished more quickly on grain feeders.
Mr Everinghan said the profit margin even for lambs that had to be intensively fed was still reasonable.
