Excessive cattle exports boosting beef prices, traders complain

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Excessive cattle exports boosting beef prices, traders complain
By Kawintra Jaisue,
Saowalak Khongphakphoon
The Nation 2011-01-14

Because of a current shortage of beef cattle after large exports to Vietnam, the per-kilo retail price of beef in Thailand has reached Bt160-Bt200 - but demand is still high.

In live-cattle markets in the Northeast, buyers are complaining about fewer head available, despite being cashed up and ready to pay.

Khamta Thongkhote, a nai hoi - a local term for a cattle buyer - said he could buy only a few head at a time now, compared with 20-30 before the shortage. "Each purchase now earns me less than Bt1,000."

Khamta, who raised all his children and funded their college education through cattle trading, said small-time nai hoi like himself could not fairly compete with middlemen, whether Thais or Lao. They packed the Isaan cattle markets and paid much higher prices, making big profits when reselling to Vietnamese or Chinese buyers.

Sommai Phoolphol, a big-time butcher in Khon Kaen, said she now gave her husband Bt200,000 when he was out visiting cattle markets - double the regular amount that could buy 10 head of cattle. "We have no guarantee whether even twice as much money can get us the number we want."

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Each head of cattle of average size now costs Bt15,000-Bt18,000 compared with Bt6,000-Bt7,000 late last year, she said. She now butchers only two animals each day and has to raise the per-kilo retail price to Bt160.

"The retail price could soon reach Bt200, because of the shortage and higher price of live cattle," she said.

Former nai hoi Thiamjan Chookhai became a rubber planter after he foresaw the drop in the cattle trade. He sold his 15 animals and turned his cattle farm into a rubber plantation.

"Vast areas of prairie for the cattle to feed on are shrinking and the cost of raising cattle prompted me to invest in a rubber plantation," he said.

Farmers in the North have heavily sold cattle to Cambodian, Vietnamese and Malaysian buyers, at higher prices than the rates offered by Thai buyers, resulting in a shortage in local markets. Chanin Songmek, manager of Tak Beef Cooperative, said local breeds of cattle remained in small numbers while farm cattle were also limited.

A Khon Kaen University lecturer in food science, Associate Professor Wiroj Phattharajinda, said government regulation was needed to roll back the excessive export volume of beef cattle, otherwise Thailand's image as "the world's gourmet kitchen" would be affected, or finally vanish altogether.

"Thailand still exports beef cattle without regulations, while neighbouring countries systematically promote production of dairy or beef cattle," he said. "They will soon compete against Thailand in exporting live cattle and likely defeat us in the end, just as Thailand is losing out to Vietnam as a key exporter of jasmine rice.

"We may one day lose our trademark as the world's gourmet kitchen" without regulations on beef-cattle exports, he said.

[boloa]

You wont hear the small time farmer with the odd few Cattle to sell complaining !!!