What is the average sized beef herd in Canada?

The average beef farm in Canada is 63 cows. Eastern Canada typically has smaller herd sizes. When you go west and into the prairies you’ll typically get larger herds. Similarly the feeding operations in eastern Canada will feed maize because they have the climate to grow it.

A typical feedlot over there might be 2,500 head. In western Canada there’s a lot more barley fed to cattle and some feedlots there will be as big as 80,000 head.

How has 2018 been for Canadian beef farmers?

Overall it’s been a good year so far. There are areas of Canada that are quite dry and feed’s going to be a little short, but prices have held together pretty well this year. There’s been good export demand for Canadian beef, particularly into Japan and China and our largest customers in the US.

What are beef prices like in Canada?

The autumn run in Canada is when most Canadian cow-calf producers (suckler farmers) sell their calves in October. For 2018, we’re forecasting prices of around C$4.40/kg (€2.90/kg) for the autumn run for calves in the 250kg–275kg range. That’s certainly at the higher end of the price range we’ve had in the last few years. Beef prices in Canada look good moving forward as markets have been holding together fairly well this year. Last week, liveweight prices for a 680kg steer were trading around C$3.20/kg (€2.11/kg).

How big is Canada’s beef industry?

We typically process about 3m to 3.5m head of cattle every year in Canada. Of this, 2.5m head are grain fed steers and heifers.

About 700,000 to 800,000 cows are culled from the herd on top of these.

The annual cattle kill moves up and down depending on the volume of feeder cattle we export live to the US.

How important are live exports to Canada’s cattle trade?

Live exports have a big impact on the trade here. Live exports to the US have been going on for the last 50 or 60 years, making our beef industry highly integrated with the US.

The number of cattle can range from 600,000 head to 1.5m head every year. That’s about 20% to 25% of production exported live, which clearly has a very significant impact on pricing. In recent years, exports have ranged from 800,000 to 900,000.

How concentrated is the Canadian beef processing industry?

It’s certainly concentrated. Between Cargill and JBS they have over 85% of our processing in just three locations. Smaller plants account for less than 15% of processing.

However, US beef companies like Agri Beef and Tyson also compete for Canadian cattle. The integrated nature of our beef industry with that of the US has been very important to create competition for cattle in our processing industry.

Dennis Laycraft will be speaking at the 2018 ASA Conference in Killashee House Hotel, Naas, Co Kildare on 6-7 September.