Sirma Karapeeva: Meat Industry Association CEO on the decline in exports in 2024

A soft landing for the red meat industry after a tough 2024. 

Meat Industry Association data reveals there was an overall 3% decline in last year's red meat exports, which reached around $10 billion. 

Total sheepmeat exports fell 3% in both volume and value. 

Chief Executive Sirma Karapeeva says it ended on a positive note with December's exports rising by 17%, reaching more than one billion dollars. 

She told Mike Hosking they’re focused on putting one foot in front of the other for 2025 and making sure they continue what they do best: producing and exporting fabulous products to the world. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
A red meat sector. What have we been doing twenty
twenty four report card, plenty of growth outside China. US
export's up thirty eight percent, UK fifty three percent, Canada
one hundred and sixteen percent. That's a total of nine
hundred No, it's not a total of nine point eight
six billion worth of steak and chops. Meat Industry Association
CEO Suma Kadapeva is back with us. A very good
morning to you. Good morning, very obvious question for you

(00:23):
America Trump tariffs. Are we in trouble or not?

Speaker 2 (00:28):
Well, Look, I think it's still too early to say
to be To be quite frank, we're certainly watching the
situation very closely, but there is no really no need
to speculate at just this at this moment because nothing
concrete has happened that would impact New Zealand.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
Somebody suggested to me all we do with America is
sell burger patties. Is that true?

Speaker 2 (00:53):
Well, yes, and no. We do sell a lot of
beef into America for the burgers, right, That's that's for sure.
But increasingly the United States has become a very important
market for our high value lamb. Their lamb consumption seems
to be increasing, and their appetite for high quality grass

(01:13):
feed New Zealand lamb is certainly increasing.

Speaker 1 (01:17):
Which is one of my arguments. Is it possible, even
if we got hit with tariffs that if you go
to the Upper East Side of New York and they
don't want a bit of the barn feed, they want
some grass feed, they'll pay whatever.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
Well, you know, potentially, it all depends on how consumers
are feeling and you know, what the economy as a
whole is doing. But as I said, you know, I
don't really want to be speculating too much about what
may or may not happen and how the tariffs may
or may not impact our exports until we've got something
concrete to analyze and discuss.

Speaker 1 (01:51):
The one hundred and sixteen percent up in Canada, I
take it that's off a low base.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
Yes it is, but Canada is an important North American
market for US, and it's great to see that. You know,
our products are now going into so many different markets
and they're growing. So I think that just kind of
reflects the continued recovery of the global demand and also
the resilience in market diversification strategy of the industry.

Speaker 1 (02:18):
Are those palms still whining about local versus our imported
stuff or not.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
Oh, I'm sure that they will always do that. But
you know, the stats show that there is demand in
the United Kingdom and we are well placed to meet
that demand.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
What's the split? Are we doing a lot of beef
a lot of lamb? Or is there venison in there?
What you know, is anyone doing better than anyone else noticeably?

Speaker 2 (02:43):
I think the split is roughly fifty to fifty between
beef and sheep. Sheep, mate, we don't in the Meat
Industry Association, we don't really take care of venison unfortunately,
so I can't talk about that venison as I understand
it as a very specialty meat, so it doesn't come
quite to the same volume at beef.

Speaker 1 (03:05):
And what's your scenes of the year? You bullish?

Speaker 2 (03:12):
Bullas might be a strong word, but we're certainly more
optimist back that the end of last year was. You know,
you know, we finished on a very positive note which
gave people a little bit of a boost, and we've
just focused on putting one foot in front of the
other four twenty five and making sure that we continue
to do what we do best, produce and export fabulous

(03:34):
product to the world.

Speaker 1 (03:35):
Fantastic, you go well with it, Tuma, We're fans Suma Kaipiva,
who is the Meat Industry Association boss. For more from
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