13th April 2002

By Peter Young

Quotes for spring lamb from export plants have dropped like a stone, as factories are trying to get down spring lambs prices for next week. ICM Navan, the only factory quoting, dropped the price 33.5c/kg in a week to 476 c/kg (170p/lb). The other plants are hinting at even lower prices. At the same time the home market is holding up well. Butcher paid up to 532c/kg (190p/lb) this week and 518c/kg (185p/lb) was paid for spring lamb on Wednesday by wholesalers. Ewe quotes remain unchanged at 168 c/kg (60p/lb) while hoggets have dropped slightly to 336 c/kg (120p/lb).

In the marts prices were steady at the start of the week. In Roscrea on Wednesday spring lambs dropped back to between €90 to €104 a head as factories stayed out of the bidding. There was very few hoggets on offer. 50kg hoggets made €75 a head and cast ewes made €40 to €75.

The major drop in factory quotes for spring lamb is not being mirrored in France. Bord Bia report prices for spring lamb and hoggets were only slightly back from last week. The very small quantities of Irish spring lambs are making between 5.03 and 5.18c/kg. The French spring lambs made 5.40c/kg. Irish hoggets also suffered a slight drop in price to 3.90c/kg. In the UK hoggets are still dominating the marts. The SQQ was slightly lower at 107.6stg p/kg liveweight. This translates into 3.92c/kg deadweight (1.40p/lb) with spring lamb in the UK averaging 4.77c/kg deadweight (1.70 p/lb).

Retention finishes on Saturday (13th April) but no flood of hoggets is expected. On top of that it's still three weeks away from large numbers of spring lambs emerging. With the factories not budging from a two day week we could see sheep farmers emulating their beef farming comrades in holding out for better prices. IFA national sheep chairman Larry Fallon is already calling for producers to stop selling and hold back numbers until the market has settled.