Sales from the Northern Ireland food and drink processing sector increased by 1.1% in 2015 to £4.6bn, with the beef and sheepmeat and milk and milk products sub-sectors seeing the largest increases in turnovers, according to provisional figures released by DAERA on Thursday.

Of the 10 sub-sectors classified by DAERA in the food and drink processing industry, seven had increases in turnover in 2015, with beef and sheepmeat sales increasing by £20.7m and milk and milk products increasing by £13.6m.

The two sub-sectors remain the largest in terms of sales in the NI industry. The beef and sheepmeat and milk and milk products turnovers of £1.26bn and £1.01bn respectively equate to 49.4% of the food and drink sector’s total turnover in 2015 when combined.

Net profit

However, the two highest turnover sub-sectors continue to have the lowest figures for net profit as a percentage of sales. Most recent figures for 2014 show that milk and milk products net profit as a percentage of sales stood at 0.5 and beef and sheepmeat had 1.5. The animal by-products and drinks sub-sectors had the highest net profit as a percentage of sales at 13.7 and 9.4 respectively.

The overall sector’s average net profit as a percentage of sales in 2014 was 3.2, which is the same as the poultrymeat sub-sector’s value and slightly less than the pigmeat sub-sector’s value of 3.3.

Sales destinations

Most recent figures available for 2014 show that Britain remained the largest market for NI food and drink, accounting for £2.01bn or 44.2% of sales. The domestic NI market had 27.4% of sales and the Republic of Ireland accounted for 15.6% of NI food and drink sales, which equates to 54.9% of export sales and 61.7% of EU sales.

Sales to EU countries other than the Republic of Ireland totalled £440m or 9.7% of total sales. Food and drink exported to countries outside the EU from NI equated to £140m or 3.1% of turnover.

The British market accounted for 63.9% of beef and sheepmeat sales, but only 22.2% of milk and milk products turnover. More milk and milk products were sold in NI at 29.7% of sales compared with 16.2% of beef and sheepmeat sales. The milk and milk products sub-sector also exported more products to the Republic of Ireland and other EU countries at 15.5% and 25.9% of sales respectively, compared with 6.2% and 12.4% for the beef and sheepmeat sub-sector.

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