BRUSSELS: In the first half of the year, EU beef and veal imports were up 3% on the same period last year at 101,000t, AHDB the organisation for the English beef and sheep industry has said.
It attributes this growth to increased volumes of chilled products, accounting for almost two-thirds of trade and consisting almost entirely of premium cuts.
The import price was up by as much as 16% it said, contributing to the only small volume increase, given the firm global market for beef and the weakness of the euro.
In US Dollar terms, the import price was actually down 6% year-on-year, it said, while Brazil remained the largest supplier by some margin, accounting for a third of all imports – shipments were up 2%.
For the two other largest suppliers, AHDB said there were contrasting trends; shipments from Uruguay were down 7%, while from Argentina they were up 8%.
South America is still the largest supplier to the EU and while its market share is still as much as two-thirds, AHDB said it had been over 90% in the first half of the previous decade.
The US continued to take advantage of the EU autonomous beef quota, with trade up by around 13%, it said.
Of the smaller suppliers, it said imports from Botswana continue to recover with shipments up three-fold in the first half of 2015.
