Yulgilbar Grazing for the Future Field Day Friday 1st July 2011
Cattle Industry Looks to the Future
In excess of 340 interested Cattle men and women gathered at Yulgilbar Station last
Friday, as the historic Baryulgil property played host to the "Grazing for the Future"
field day.
A large contingent of local business's supported the day by conducting trade sites,
displaying the latest products and technology available to Beef Producers.
Owned by Baillieu and Sarah Myer and family; and Managed by Rob and Lorraine
Sinnamon, Yulgilbar Station is the largest Santa Gertrudis Stud in New South Wales
and covers some 35 000 acres running 5500 head of primarily Santa Gertrudis cattle.
Rob gave an overview of the properties operations and a large number of Yulgilbar
cattle being prepared for Yulgilbar 's annual production sale on Friday 2nd September
were on display. The dedicated team at Yulgilbar were on hand to answer questions
from the interested crowd.
Industry leaders gathered to update Beef Producers of various topical beef industry
topics. Not surprisingly the current Live Export crisis in Indonesia dominated the mood
of the crowd.
MLA board member, Rob Anderson updated concerned producers on the Indonesian
situation, outlining what steps are being implemented to ensure the resumption of trade
in this essential market for the Australian Beef Industry.
While Southern Beef Producers in Northern New South Wales are not currently directly
affected by the ban, the audience were informed that the ongoing suspension of the
Indonesian trade will impact all Australian Markets, as stranded cattle destined for
export are diverted South and East into Domestic Markets, creating an oversupply of
store cattle and impacting on prices here in Australia.
Yulgilbar Station Manager, Rob Sinnamon raised the issue of the Federal Government
instigated hardship to Australian Beef Producers, effectively driving many northern beef
producers to financial ruin and creating extreme potential welfare issues here in
Australia as thousands of cattle remain stranded originally destined for live export.
President of the National Farmers Federation , Jock Laurie highlighted the fact that
MLA is the only organisation working in Indonesia from any other country, addressing
welfare concerns in a Nation where we have no direct political influence.
Australian Beef Producers do not want short term compensation, that goes "no- where"
in resolving the financial hardship now faced by Northern Australian Beef Producers;
was the message being heard said from Northern Australian producers, citing the only
"right " resolution to the "Indonesian Beef Crisis was ensuring a speedy resumption of
trade to Indonesia and ensure only abbatoirs with approved welfare practices kill
Australia bred cattle.
Jock was upbeat about the current opportunities for Australian Beef citing an increasing
global population and ever increasing demand for protein, while warning we need to
remain vigilant with " quarantine regulations" that ensure we remain disease free.
He went on to touch on the fact that the new Proposed Carbon tax is likely to reduce the
net profit of Australian Beef Producers by up to 20%.
Jed Madz (Deputy Director of Cattle Council) and accompanied by Cattle Council NSW
representative-Terry Toohey) gave Beef Producers an overview of the role Cattle
Council has in formulating policy for the Australian Beef Industry. He highlighted that
Cattle Council represents 13 000 beef producers .
Gary Burridge (General Manager) of locally based Northern Co-operative Meat
Company in Casino highlighted future opportunities for Australian Beef, citing
countries such as China, Indonesia, Malaysia, The Phillipines, Singapore, Middle East
and the European Union all as markets being further investigated and targeted.
Gary highlighted that there is a Global shortage of protein , but Australia had to compete
with other countries also keen to gain market share. Australian Beef now has to battle
the impact of a high Australian Dollar, competition from other protein sources, animal
welfare issues ,overseas tariffs and subsidies.
A Beef processor utilising the Casino facility was David Larkin from Atron Enterprises.
David spoke to local Beef producers of the benefit of embracing MSA(Meat Standards
Australia)and how the science of MSA can add up to $40 /head more for our cattle.
David Brett-Head of Agri-business -National Australia Bank for the Northern Territory,
Queensland and New South Wales told the large crowd that NAB is confident about
Australian Agricultural prospects in the next 12-18 months. He based this assumption
on the solid medium term seasonal outlook, good soil moisture profile in many areas,
good fodder supplies and 2 years of water in irrigation storages.
David said the major concerns for our industry was the ongoing strength of the
Australian dollar and local interest rates.
Consistent with the theme of Grazing for the Future, Bill Hoffman and Wayne Upton
(both respected Beef Extension Officers) who have spent a career servicing the Beef
Industry) spoke about two emerging research projects that Yulgilbar Station is assisting
with validation work.
Bill Hoffman( now Hoffman Beef Consulting) covered the Beef CRC funded Fertility
related research project, exploring the "age to puberty" and how to manage tropical
breeds of cattle in challenging environments for breeding cattle as typified here in
Coastal Northern New South Wales. By selecting and retaining females that reach
puberty earlier in life, breed back in calf and returning a positive pregnancy has
potential to increase output and productivity within a breeding herd; was the take home
message of Bill's presentation, with Bill saying," selecting females that reached puberty
earlier was a genuine selection tool for fertility."
Recently retired Genetic Extension Specialist with the Animal Genetics and Breeding
Unit from the New England University, Wayne Upton covered off on current research
and validation work surrounding the development of a genetic polledness marker, to aid
in the selection of producing homozygous poll cattle.
An obvious benefit of the research work is the ability for producers to select genetics
that will produce poll offspring , reducing or eliminating the need to dehorn beef cattle
by producing progeny bred without horns(an objective of host property and Santa
Gertrudis Stud-Yulgilbar who are strongly focused on breeding poll Santa Gertrudis
Cattle).
Six bulls drafted for the demonstration who all looked polled, graphically illustrated the
genetic outcomes that cannot be assessed pheno -typically.
Two bulls were actually horned bulls, that were well dehorned and looked like poll bulls
however were likely to produce only horn progeny, 2 bulls that were pheno-typically
polled, but were also genetically tested to produced 50% of progeny poll; while the
remaining 2 bulls that were both pheno- typically poll, were also genotyped as
Homozygous Poll, meaning all progeny they produce; irrelevant of the horn status of
the female would be poll. This session created a lot of interest along with beef
producers taking the opportunity to assess and guess the weight of the large Poll bullYulgilbar Councillor, who was declared later in the day as weighing 1145kg.
Santa Gertrudis Classifier ,Geoff Coombe travelled from Rockhampton to conduct a
series of practical drafting and structural correctness demonstrations with a group of
young heifers, that gained significant interaction from an enthusiastic crowd, while Local
North Coast Senior District Veterinarian for LHPA , Mathew Ball discussed Bio Security
with Beef Producers , highlighting the importance of implementing sound Management
practices covering the production and management of livestock.
Rob Sinnamon