AUSTRALIA is running out of sheep, but who really cares?
Certainly the livestock agencies, transporters, saleyards, meat processors and the live exporters are worried to varying degrees, but there is little they can do to halt the slide or boost sheep numbers.
Producers don't seem to really care whether sheep numbers are going up or down. What matters most to them is turning a profit from their enterprises rather than counting the nation's sheep or worrying about whether there will be enough wool or lamb to cloth or feed local or overseas consumers.
Since the collapse of the wool reserve-price scheme in 1991, sheep numbers have more than halved from 170 million to 77 million and yet the annual disposal of sheep and lambs has remained relatively constant.
Back in 1991-92, the combined lamb and sheep slaughtering and live exports was 39 million head, which included about 16 million lambs.
Since then, the lamb kill has edged up to more than 20 million, while sheep for mutton and the live-sheep trade have fallen to less than 15 million head.
Just how long the prime-lamb sector can continue to hold its domestic and export market shares, while breeding numbers continue to fall, no one is willing to guess.
The 2010-15 Red Meat Strategic plan, compiled by the Red Meat Advisory Council, of which the Sheepmeat Council of Australia and processors are members, states the noble goal of "guaranteeing vital food for the nation and the world".
But despite addressing such vital issues as infrastructure, market access and marketing, the supply issue seems to have been overlooked.
In June, the Sheepmeat Council acknowledged the possibility of unsustainably higher slaughter rates.
It said the situation could be improved through increased reproduction rates, improved genetics and more targeted nutrition.
"A return to good seasons would also be a good start," its July newsletter said.
Lamb processors such as Castricums acknowledge they can do no more than what they are doing now to boost lamb production.
Director Theo Castricum said his company was concerned about what impact a shortfall in lambs would have on their operations and their markets.
"But what more can we do?" he said, referring to the buoyant prices of the past 12 months.
West Australian exporter and shipper, Wellard, is another company concerned with the fall in sheep numbers.
Wellard is one of three big exporters sharing in the state's current three million boat sheep.
It has a big investment at all stages of trade including trucking, depots and its own ships, as well as a big interest in rebuilding the state's flock which has halved in 10 years with less than 15 million head forecast for this year.
General manager of Wellard's Middle Eastern livestock trade, Garry Robinson, blamed poor wool prices, the rising cost of running sheep and attractiveness of cereal crops for the flock decline.
Even the current export price in the West of $88 for a heavy Merino wether has done little to encourage producers to curb the flock decline.
Mr Robinson said Wellard could see the folly in buying ewes which otherwise should be retained for breeding and, accordingly, was deliberately setting its prices to discourage their sale.
Mr Robinson said the company was also considering other measures including long-term contracts with producers for the supply of boat sheep.
And he said the company wouldn't rule out the option of paying producers to breed and grow out sheep for the live export trade.
Veteran Landmark Bendigo wool representative Athol Frederick is confident that given a return to good seasons the flock trend would turn around.
Mr Frederick said a return to more buoyant wool prices might also encourage a return to sheep, but he said producers had to be realistic and recognise that the Eastern Market Indicator might only range from 700-1000c/kg in the foreseeable future.
Poll Dorset and White Suffolk ram breeder and immediate past president of the Sheepmeat Council, Rodney Watt, said much would depend on the fortunes in the grain industry.
"Currently we are seeing up here (Grenfell in central NSW) grain prospects falling over and, with a wheat price of only $180 a tonne, many farmers were wishing they were running more sheep," he said.
"They all know that sheep are the most profitable enterprise at the moment, but it is not easy buying back into sheep."
