Grass-fed Beef Demand Grows

Exactly how a beef animal is grazed is becoming a hot topic as increased consumer awareness begins to influence producer considerations.

Not only is success measured in weight gain per head and margins. For a growing number of cattlemen, the ethical and environmental credentials of each pound of beef is realised in price.

This summer, Canada got its first 100 per cent grass fed beef brand and the US revealed annual growth in the grass fed market of 10 per cent since 2003.

Urban consumption has yielded the biggest reaction. This has coincided with a policy move that has seen the US Department of Agriculture offer a Non Genetically Modified Organism label for organic or grass fed growers.

This was the take home message of livestock management consultant Dr Allen Williams while addressing the Annual Grass-fed Beef Conference last month in the US.

Also at the conference was Abe Collins, a beef production adviser, who spoke of the virtues of properly grazed pasture and its environmental benefits.

Mr Collins prescribed that grazing should remove 25-30 per cent of the plant as this both gives the animal what it needs and gives the most efficient defoliation for soil and plant health.

Over grazing, Mr Collins added, leads to roots dying and carbon captures suffers as a result.

Instead, grazing should stimulate root and shoot production to capture carbon through ‘root exudates’, he added.

This means that the soil can build glomalin, a ‘glue’ that holds healthy soils together.

Through using fewer chemicals, altering stocking densities and implementing what is understood about marginal upland and semi-woodland areas, scientists believe beef can be produced sustainably.

This is one of the motives behind a recent Royal Society study from the UK which has scrutinised silvo-agricultural livestock systems in less developed farming nations.

The paper says that woodland grazing can replace many existing systems in parts of the world, particularly in Latin America and the Caribbean, to ensure sustainable production.

The paper says that a system or procedure is sustainable if it is acceptable now and if its effects will be acceptable in future, in particular in relation to resource availability, consequences of functioning and morality of action.

It remains up to marketing departments and shoppers to decide what value this should have, but the study, led by Professor Donald Broom says silvo-pastoral farming provides better welfare, increases biodiversity and profits.