Good Herdsman Secures Large European Organic Meat Contract

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Good Herdsman Secures Large European Organic Meat Contract

Organic meat processor The Good Herdsman have secured a new organic babyfood contract in Germany worth over E2 million annually. This will involve almost 300 tonnes of Irish organic meat per year.

Former Minister Trevor Sargent, Josef Finke and John Purcell at an earlier Biofach

The tonnage will be made up of 160 tonnes of beef, 100 of veal and 35 of lamb. This follows a trial run of 15 tonnes October last. This new arrangement has just been put into place this month, and may well begin to address the leakage of organic meat into the conventional sector.

Organic babyfood has long been a strong driver of the organic sector. As long ago as 1996, 60% of babyfood on the German market was already certified organic. Not only is the market very mature on the Continent, in countries like Italy and Russia, veal is very much sought after, especially for babyfood.

John Purcell of the Good Herdsman is understandably delighted with this new deal. “We need to keep weanlings in the organic system” he tells me, pointing out that as many as 3 to 4000 are lost to the conventional sector each year.

Indeed almost 7000 organic cattle are lost into the conventional system annually, despite prices that are considered high by European standards.

With such heavy loses, there is now a new opportunity to prevent leakage. “We're not aiming to take organic beef weanlings out of the system to supply this new market, we're aiming to prevent animals being lost to the conventional sector” Purcell points out.

To address these new needs for extra organic veal animals, The Good Herdsman will have monthly weigh days in Skibbereen mart, with payments on the day. One such mart is upcoming Tuesday 4th February. Cork has significant numbers of organic sucklers by national standards.

Price wise, with an average of about E2.51kg for 8 month old Irish conventional veal animals, the organic price is likely to be about 20% above this conventional price.

Organic veal is not produced in confinement, nor is it bucket fed. The calves suckle their mothers right up to slaughter age, so the meat is red rather than pink. They are essentially reared as normal calves up to 8 months, while the bull calves are not castrated.

John Purcell tells me that “250 kg liveweight is ideal for veal, continentals such as Belgan Blues work well, while dairy calves can also work. We've killed Belgian Blues at 340 kg at 8 months. Calves can often be about 220 kg at that age, farmers should be aiming for 250kg”.

Purcell also recommends that “farmers start to prepare now.” He adds “if they are calving down in February or March, its worth having this veal option in mind.” If farmers opt for this, then they should “keep the bulls as bulls, and get in touch as soon as possible with the Good Herdsman, with ideally three to four months notice.”

Irish organic meat gets a great reception in Europe, due to Ireland's lack of a tradition of industralisation. There are also style differences between the Irish and Continental products; “In France there are a lot of dairy animals in the system, while in Germany bull beef dominates” says Purcell.

“We’ve stand at Biofach in Germany from 11th of February, I'd encourage farmers to attend and get involved. Irish organic farmers can be more market led, the demand for organic food in most of Europe is immense.”

He points to organic meat sales rising by 12% in Germany, 9% in Sweden and 13% in France.

“In France we had no market just two years ago, now we supply 16 five star hotels with striplions, and its growing every month.”

The future could be said to look bright then, for many segments of the Irish organic meat sector.

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