The number of lambs coming from Northern Ireland to southern factories fell last week to the lowest number this year so far. Just 4,509 lambs came south for slaughter last week, the fourth week in a row of big falls. As recently as the week ending 21 March, 8,239 lambs from Northern Ireland were processed by southern factories.

It appears that the extension of the country of origin legislation on labelling lamb from 1 April is a big part of the reason for this.

Industry sources have told the Irish Farmers Journal that the new labelling requirements are causing huge segregation and batching issues for factories and their customers.

This means that for some processors, the new legislation is making lamb from Northern Ireland more bother than it is worth.

Interestingly, the big issue at this point seems to be segregation and batching issues. The fact that the “designation UK” mark will also appear on the label at the consumer end could also be an issue, although that remains to be seen.

This is the reverse of the cattle issue that came to a head last year, when Northern Ireland factories began severely penalising cattle that came originally from southern farms.

Their reasoning at the time was being unable to get supermarket customers to carry an additional mixed origin range on top of Irish and British ranges.

This hurt farmers and marts, particularly in the west of Ireland where Northern cattle buyers bought store and breeding cattle. It could be about to do the same for their Northern Ireland counterparts with sheep.