Turkey may be regional livestock leader with proper policies

Bayraktar was speaking at a press conference in Ankara to disclose the details of the TZOB’s latest “Red Meat Sector Assessment Report,” which was prepared with contributions from the Industry and Trade Ministry, Foreign Trade Undersecretariat, universities and companies in the sector.

Bayraktar suggested that Turkey take measures soon to boost domestic ovine and cattle production by removing obstacles that currently deter farmers from animal husbandry and introducing incentives to encourage more animal breeding along with mechanisms to more efficiently. regulate the domestic meat market.

Under the current conditions, however, Turkey is far from rising as a regional leader, Bayraktar argued, and exemplified his remark by pointing out that Turkey earned $250 million from cattle meat sales and $30 million from sheep and goat meat sales annually 20 years ago, without affecting domestic consumption. However, today’s figures indicate the long distance Turkey needs to travel to turn around in animal breeding and rise as a regional power, he said and added that Turkey’s total revenues from its meat exports are now just $12 million per year and that even this small figure is enough to create serious problems in the domestic market.

Turkey has geographic proximity to the world’s biggest ovine importers, the Arabic countries of the Middle East including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates and Lebanon, Bayraktar asserted. However, Turkey is not able to capitalize on this opportunity due to its endemic problems in animal husbandry and meat production, he argued.

He quoted figures released by the Turkish Statistics Institute (TurkStat), which noted that the number of slaughtered cattle in the last decade was down by 21 percent. The rates of decline were 29 percent for water buffalo, 43 percent for sheep and 73 percent for goats. In total, Bayraktar noted, 29 percent fewer animals are butchered now than 10 years ago, meaning a sharp drop in meat production -- except a three percent increase in cattle meat due to more efficient practices. The production of water buffalo meat has decreased 33 percent in the last decade; this figure is 41 percent for sheep and 72 percent for goats. Total meat production decreased by 9 percent in the last 10 years.

There are a number of long and short-term reasons for the sharp decline in the amount of livestock farmed, Bayraktar said and explained: “Increasing exports is one of the factors. The products that are already far from meeting domestic demand are growing more scarce due to sales abroad, in detriment to the supply-demand balance of the domestic market.” He said the sheep and goat exports to Lebanon are especially noteworthy.

Another reason Bayraktar mentioned is the illegal trade of animals to neighboring countries due to sharp price increases in those markets. The slaughtering of cattle by farmers to increase meat and milk prices in the domestic market is another major reason behind the scarcity of animals, Bayraktar alleged.

Small livestock producers have been forced out of the sector, selling their sheep and goat stocks due to high feed prices and relatively unprofitable meat, milk and wool sales, Bayraktar noted. In addition, hurdles to finding adequate feed in the last two years -- because of the drought -- has led farmers involved in animal husbandry to get out of the business. These farmers slaughtered their animals, even those kept for breeding.

The nearly 2 million animals kept off the market to fatten ahead of Eid al-Fitr also contributed to the supply-demand imbalance, Bayraktar said. “In addition, the poor incentives provided for small livestock breeding are not sufficient even for the protection of the sector, let alone the development of it,” he said. Inadequate pastures, the inability to access certain grazing areas or fertile plains in the southeastern and eastern regions of Anatolia due to the threat of terrorism and the entry of the state-owned Meat and Fish Institution (EBK) into competition with private companies to provide meat for the army and other state establishments are among other problems Bayraktar listed.

As a solution to these problems, the TZOB President suggested increased incentives for domestic animal producers and strict measures against meat imports. “If imports increase, local producers will exit the business and will not return. Then, it would be unavoidable to be dependent on foreign producers,” he argued.