Canterbury deer farmers feeding back on new industry plan

Canterbury’s deer farmers are among the stakeholders to give feedback recently on the future of the deer industry and especially the need to lift farmgate prices.

Over the past month, the South Canterbury & North Otago and Canterbury & West Coast branches of the New Zealand Deer Farmers Association (NZDFA), and other of the region’s deer farmers, have been involved in sessions with Deer Industry NZ (DINZ) board members and in kitchen table meetings.

The DINZ board’s top-down vision for the Deer Industry Strategy to 2027, is one of the topics that has been ‘robustly discussed’, along with the continued need for improved venison prices, industry actions to restore confidence and the continuous increase in costs of compliance and inputs.

For DINZ chief executive Innes Moffat, the meetings highlighted the desire of all parties to be part of a thriving industry, “but that the money needs to be in it to thrive.”

Cantabrian feedback is helping to refine the DINZ operational programme. DINZ staff are now looking at the priority areas to ensure there is capacity within the organisation to deliver on those priorities.

The new plans, subject to approval by the DINZ board, will be communicated to the rest of the industry at the 2023 Deer Industry Conference to be held on 10 May in Ashburton.

Those interested in attending can register at deernz.org/home/events/2023-deer-industry-conference

Participants learned of the venison companies’ latest marketing activities to help get more value into the venison schedule.

All five companies – Alliance, Duncan NZ,

First Light, Mountain River Venison and Silver Fern Farms – are working hard in the tri-market development model, “a third to the US, a third to Europe and a third to China and other markets”.

Creating stable demand through market diversification is the best approach to achieve a “steady, permanent increases in venison prices” they believe.

“Stronger sales into Europe and more year-round shipments of venison into less seasonal markets, plus anticipated higher pricing later in the year,” has resulted in the holding up of venison prices this year, DINZ noted in a letter to participants afterwards.

A steady rise in venison prices over 2023 is expected by venison exporters, with some indicating spring schedules above last year and that a “minimum spring peak of $10/kg could be achieved”, said DINZ.

Others, while “very confident of improving prices”, chose not to indicate prices as spring schedules were dependent on factors like currency.

All are well aware, however, of deer farmers’ need for “returns of $12/kg” to restore confidence in venison production.

Work by farm consultant Wayne Allen in 2022 on comparative farm profitability indicated – at the time – with the lamb schedule running at $8 to $9 per kg, venison then needed to be at $9.50-10.50/kg. The venison schedule needed to be running on a weighted average of $11.50-$12.35/kg to be competitive with velvet production.

Current lamb farmgate prices at are sitting at $6.00-7.00/kg. While lamb marketers will be confident it has reached the bottom, and will recover again, it shows the pressures currently at play in the global marketplace.

Aiming for the $10/kg spring peak this year for venison will be an improvement on 2022 and will lead to further improvement the following year which, DINZ said: “will build farmers’ confidence that venison can compete with other land use options.”

Deer farmers around the country, including Canterbury, have also been looking after their own. They’ve been actively fund-rais- ing and providing practical support for their peers in northern regions affected by Cyclone Gabrielle, especially in Hawke’s Bay, Gisborne and Northland.

Over $117,000 was raised in an online auction on 15 March, organised by NZDFA, using PGG Wightson’s bidr system, to put into the kitty to help deer farmers recovery. This will go towards travel costs for fencing teams helping with replacement of boundary fencing, among other things.

While the future looks tough, New Zealand’s deer farmers are thinking ahead to get ahead.