The Country 29/05/25: Chris Russell talks to Jamie Mackay

Our Aussie correspondent talks State of Origin and the state of the lamb, beef and dairy markets. Plus, we look at the silver lining from the terrible NSW flooding. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
He's our Asie correspondent of long standing Chris Russell, based
out of Sydney. He would have been cocker hoop about
the cockroaches beating the cane toads and State of Origin
last night, Chris, I must say, am I getting old
and boring? Or is State of Origin losing its appeal?
Because I always remember I used to coincide the first
State of Origin game with field Days something to watch

(00:22):
while I was at field Days, which is still two
weeks away. So are they bringing this forward? Has it
still got the interests that it's had on both sides
of the Tasmand do you.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Reckon in New South Wales? I would say, you know, there's.

Speaker 3 (00:34):
No loss of appeal down here at the moment because
we're definitely the flavor of the month.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
I don't know why they bought it earlier.

Speaker 3 (00:40):
I think it's all to do with scheduling around all
the other round games and so on and so forth.
But nonetheless, you know, I mean, the game really flattered Queensland.

Speaker 2 (00:50):
You know, when you look.

Speaker 3 (00:51):
At our side, we've got the side of the century
in the sense you know when you look at Nathan Cleary, Mitch,
Moses Latrell, Mitchell and Bryan Tohoe all in the one side,
I mean ted income. You know, there's not a site
in the world you put up against them, and you know,
fantastic and great to see us in good shape and
really the Queensland didn't know they were cut drawn or board,

(01:14):
yes last night.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
And I think we're looking good for the series.

Speaker 1 (01:17):
New South Wales, looking good for state of origin, the
state of New South Wales though Chris Russell not looking
so good. Really bad flooding and there's been more since
we chadded last week.

Speaker 2 (01:28):
Well it has been.

Speaker 3 (01:30):
And when you actually look at one of the things
that surprised me is that they're a number of dairy farmers,
I mean in Australia, in New South Wales at least
our dairy farms have dropped from around seventeen hundred and
twenty in two thousand down to four hundred and fifty
in total in twenty twenty four. And of those, one
hundred and.

Speaker 2 (01:50):
Thirty seven were pretty much wiped out by the floods.

Speaker 3 (01:53):
So that's a quarter of our dairy farms who we
are more more than a quarter which are just not
present anymore. And that's going to definitely affect our dairy
supply here, not to mention our long term genetics and.

Speaker 2 (02:07):
So on, with cows being lost all over the place.

Speaker 3 (02:09):
So it's been very devastating this flood, certainly a one
in five hundred year flood, and it happens so quickly
no one could prepare for it.

Speaker 2 (02:17):
But they say there's.

Speaker 3 (02:18):
Always a silver lining, and my father always used to
say there's much more money in mud than dust long term.
So all the farmers that drive so their crop down
in southern New South Wales have now had their optimism.
If you're like rewarded by this rain, so that will
They all had fifty to seventy millimeters of rain down
around Waga, Tomora, all those countries down Coolerman and so

(02:42):
on in southern New South Wales.

Speaker 2 (02:44):
So that's an exciting thing out of all this rain.

Speaker 3 (02:48):
It's interesting too, Jamie, that are up in the Northern
Territory in northwest West Australia. They've had record raking rains
up there. Now once again they'll flood for a while,
but they don't care much because you know, much better
that than being dried out. So it's it's sort of
a mixed blessing. But by Gee. The farmers on the coast,
they're really battling and it's going to take a long

(03:09):
time for them to recover.

Speaker 1 (03:11):
We've had Fonterra here in New Zealand today announcing it's
opening four cast milk price for the twenty five twenty
sixth season. What's happening on your side of the tesment.

Speaker 3 (03:21):
Yeah, well they've just lifted its weighted average milk price
for the rest of twenty four to twenty five to
eight dollars thirty five a kilo of milk solids. Now
they've told the opening price is going to be eight
dollars sixty for next season, which they're sort of trying
to speak up.

Speaker 2 (03:40):
That's significantly less than you.

Speaker 3 (03:42):
And as far as the farmers here concern, I knowed
the comedy by United Dairy Farmers of Victoria president Bernie
Free said it was just a slap in the face
for dairy farmers. He said he thinks Fonterra doesn't want
the milk. That's a signal of the farmers. And look
at the drought that's affecting western Victoria, South Australia, Gibbs
Land in Northern Victoria where most of the milk is

(04:04):
they should be talking around ten dollars. They're getting eight
dollars sixty five. He doesn't know why that's so low,
and it's certainly no encouragement for people to put in
the work and grow their dairy production.

Speaker 1 (04:16):
Jamie, Well, it's ten bucks over here, Chris. I'm even
if we take the exchange rate into play. New Zealand
dairy farmers are doing considerably better, you would think out
of Fontier than the Aussie ones are. Maybe they don't
want the milk. I don't know what about the lamb prices,
These go from high to higher.

Speaker 3 (04:33):
Yes, well, a lamb price last week broke the record
three times in twenty four hours. Three of our big
lamb marketspeller at Horseham and warreckon the Bill, all in Victoria.
And they also said that they're expecting you to go
even higher again. You're looking at heavy lambs. Heavy lambs
here to find us over twenty six kilos. They're saying
four hundred and ten dollars ahead at Warwickner Bill. It's

(04:56):
a lot of money for a lamb. Now, of course,
if you look at the store lamb price since they've
gone the other way, because no one's got any confidence
they're going.

Speaker 2 (05:03):
To have any feed down in southern Victoria.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
But in terms of the expectation of having enough lamb
for the market and for the advertise over the next
few weeks, there's obviously a lot of pessimism there. So
anyone who's got heavy lands at the moment is making
a lot of money, Jamie.

Speaker 1 (05:18):
So let's have a look at Ossie Beef like Kiwi
Farm as you're enjoying record prices, the good times are
set to continue.

Speaker 2 (05:26):
Yes, Well, I noticed that the SIAL Trade Show I think.

Speaker 3 (05:30):
That stands for Salon Lannim Andacion some of or other,
which is basically the biggest food show in the world,
is in Shanghai this week.

Speaker 2 (05:39):
Five thousand exhibitors there.

Speaker 3 (05:42):
Australia had a two hundred square meter stand, that's quite
a big stand, right next to an American stand of
the same size. The Australian stand absolutely flooded with buyers
the entire show. American stand pretty much deserted, and half
the exhibitors didn't even bother sending anyone from America directer.
They just relied on local representation. So you know, at

(06:03):
the moment we're absolutely killing it compared with America. Of course,
that could all change if they reissued permits to a
lot of the American adverertoires, But currently ninety percent of
the American averatires haven't had their licenses renewed. Plus there's
also this tariff war going on, which is adding significantly
the price. So in terms of grain fed product, we're

(06:25):
making hay while the sun shines. We have plenty of
the market for our grain fed meat. I must say,
and as I think I said a few weeks ago,
everyone's nervous about becoming redependent on China, but I think
everyone knows this could be very short term. But the
short term it is, and I think all of our
people feedlots in particular over here are exporting everyday can

(06:48):
export and making the most of a very point market
for high quarter the end of the market, Jovi, long.

Speaker 1 (06:55):
May it continue and go the cane toads and state
of origin too. I think it's over and perth in
about three weeks time. We'll catch you next week on
the country, Chris, Ye look forward to Jamie