Now that Ireland has secured access to the Chinese beef market, we need to consider the patterns of the global beef trade and where Ireland can fit in best to return a benefit to beef farmers.

The USDA has published its latest forecast for trading patterns of beef in 2018. Overall, it is predicting that 10.4m tonnes of beef will be traded internationally in 2017, which reflects year-on-year growth from the 8.1m tonnes that were traded in 2012.

Global exports

More beef will be available in 2018 than last year for international trade, with Brazil forecast to increase exports to 1.9m tonnes, up from 1.7m tonnes in 2017. Argentina is also recovering its place as a huge beef exporter since the election of a free market government in 2015. Exports for 2018 are predicted by USDA to reach 350,000t, up from 293,000t in 2017- a 19% increase. The USA is also a huge exporter of beef, forecast to be 1.372m tonnes in 2018, but it will also import a similar amount, 1.379m tonnes. This is because it has a disproportionately high demand for burger meat and a surplus of steak meat from its own production.

Importers

With this week's news on China, the USDA prediction for that market is of particular interest to Irish farmers and factories. It is predicting that import demand will grow by 23% this year and reach 1.2m tonnes (carcase weight equivalent – CWE). Carcase weight is approximately 25% more than boneless beef weight.

China is now the leading net beef importing nation by a distance. Next is Japan, which is forecast to import 832,000t, South Korea on 559,000t, Russia on 400,000t, Hong Kong on 580,000t and the EU, which is forecast by USDA to import 340,000t in 2018.

Where does this leave Ireland?

The good news is that China is a rapidly growing market for beef, with volumes 10 times what they were a decade ago. The downside is that while the opportunity is growing, so is the product that is available to fill it and all of it is from the lower cost producing areas of the world. Ireland is the largest net exporter of beef in the northern hemisphere and fifth overall in the world. We are seriously dependent on the UK, which is a particularly high-value market, but the threat of Brexit hangs over it. China is an excellent addition to the existing portfolio of Irish beef export markets, but will never be a replacement for the UK.