Research programme aims to boost venison sales in Europe
A NEW $16 million research programme aims to stop the slide in deer farming by making venison available to European markets at an earlier time, and to open up fresh export opportunities.
Europeans prefer to eat venison from October through to December, but most New Zealand venison is not ready for export until December-January.
Chief executive of Deer Industry New Zealand, Dan Coup, said farmers needed to finish their deer faster.
‘‘Fawns are usually born in November but are not finished until December the following year. What we need to do is develop better feeding techniques and animal health systems. Already there are farmers who are managing to achieve this,’’ Coup said.
The deer industry and government have joined forces in a primary growth partnership (PGP) called ‘‘Passion2Profit’’, which hopes to deliver economic benefits of $56m per year in additional revenue by the end of the programme.
The Ministry for Primary Industries will contribute almost $7.4m over seven years, with the balance coming from Deer Industry New Zealand and its partners.
Coup said one of the focuses of the programme was research into feeds, especially alternative to ryegrass such as fodder beet, chicory, lucerne, and understanding optimum feeding rates. New Zealand farmers tended to underfeed their stock, he said.
‘‘We are hoping to make a difference from day one. We have already started several of the projects,’’ he said.
Another focus was on developing new markets such as China, which already has a large farmed deer herd, mainly for velvet.
‘‘This is centred in the north. There is likely to be a culture of venison eating which we could tap into, or there are large numbers of 5-star restaurants throughout the country which prepare venison western-style,’’ Coup said.
Venison exports would not boom in the same way as sheepmeat, which had become popular in traditional hotpot cuisine.
Recently New Zealand processing plants had been approved to export venison to China.
In 2005 there were 1.7 million farmed deer but since the global financial crisis and conversion of farms to dairy, numbers have dropped to 1 million.
MPI Minister Nathan Guy has also announced a second new PGP programme for lamb called ‘‘Targeting New Wealth with High Health’’.
The seven-year, $25m project, with half of the funding contributed by MPI, aims to develop lamb lower in saturated fat, and higher levels of polyunsaturated fat and healthy omega-3 oils.
The programme is a collaboration between the Alliance Group and Headwaters New Zealand – a group of farmer shareholders with interests in farms throughout the country, which is providing the livestock.
Alliance Group general manager marketing, Murray Brown said the programme could see greater value extracted from carcasses thanks to the development of a wide range of new health-focused product.
‘‘We will be looking at developing different product forms, such as baby food, pet food and health foods,’’ he said.
The programme had the potential to generate $400m in additional revenue to the primary sector over 25 years.
Once the two new approved programmes are under contract, there will be 18 PGP programmes under way, with two recently completed. A total of approximately $720m is being coinvested by industry and the Government over the life of the programmes.