New data shows national beef production record and high value

Australian beef production has hit a new record, while Victorian producers lead the nation in both beef and sheepmeat value.

Australia has reached a new beef production record, while Victorian producers steam ahead for value and slaughter.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics has released its quarterly livestock production figures to September, with beef production hitting a record 724,921 tonnes, up by 2.3 per cent.

Meat and Livestock Australia market information analyst Emiliano Diaz said there was 717,891 tonnes processed last quarter which was the first time Australia reached above 700,000 tonnes produced.

He said cattle slaughter was the highest figure since 1978 on 2.97 million. The most recent high figure was 2.46 million in 2014. Meanwhile, the value for beef followed suit as Victoria reached a beef value of $1.24bn.

New ABS data is out for sheep and lamb slaughter. Picture: Zoe Phillips

Mr Diaz said Victoria reached a state record for sheep and lamb value, and more lambs slaughtered.

“Producers have never made more money, we also get the value that processors paid producers for their finished animal and Australian beef producers made $5.5bn for the quarter,” he said.

“Normally with record production prices would normally fall but prices are the second highest they’ve ever been, and demand is keeping prices high.”

For the sheepmeat industry, all states dropped in their mutton production except for Victoria, which rose by five per cent.

NSW dropped by 14 per cent, South Australia by 26 per cent and Western Australia by 29 per cent.

For lamb, Mr Diaz said Australian producers were on track for high slaughter and production, but would fail to reach a new record.

“As conditions improve in Victoria we may see producers holding on to a few more for lambs to put some weight on, but that’ll delay the flush,” he said.

“Victoria is the leading state with 2.8 million lambs slaughtered, but that’s 20 per cent less than the previous quarter.

“We think the season has been a bit late, so we’ll see more animals coming through later in the year or in early 2026.”

Victorian sheep producers made $804mil in the September quarter.

Meanwhile, red meat production dropped 1.4 per cent overall alongside chicken meat production, while pig meat production rose 1.4 per cent to 119,993 tonnes. The gross value of cattle and calves slaughtered had the highest increase with 13.5 per cent to $5.5bn, and sheep and lambs slaughtered fell 4.9 per cent to $1.6bn.