Regional differences in beef cattle trade and movements associated with the COVID-19 pandemic in Australia

Context

The COVID-19 pandemic caused mandated restrictions on movements and distancing of people with implications for meat supply chains. Despite the COVID restrictions, agricultural activities were permitted to continue as essential services in Australia. However, there were reported shortages of meat on the shelves of supermarkets and a general increase in the price of meat in Australia during the COVID period. Hence, there is a need to establish whether the restrictions affected upstream activities in Australia’s beef supply chain.

Aim

This study aims to examine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and confounding factors including rainfall and export bans on beef cattle trade and movement in Australia.

Methods

Using annual data on beef cattle sold, purchased, transferred off-farm and transferred onto farms sourced from the database of the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences, a t-test analysis was conducted to establish the significant changes in cattle movement and trade for the pre-COVID (2014–2019) and COVID (2020–2022) periods. Additionally, a flexible least squares model augmented with a flexible generalised least squares model was used to assess the impact of confounding factors on cattle trade and movement.

Key results

The results indicate no significant change in the proportion of beef cattle sold nationwide. Tasmania, New South Wales, and Western Australia (WA) recorded significant changes (1.4% increase, 3.6% increase, and 3.8% decrease, respectively) in the proportion of beef cattle purchased. For WA, these changes were localised to changes that occurred in WA Central and Southern Wheat Belt and WA Southwest Coastal regions. Moreover, rainfall did not significantly impact cattle trade but did affect cattle movements. The export ban only significantly impacted beef cattle sold in Queensland.

Conclusions

Overall, the findings suggest that most regions in Australia did not experience significant changes in farm-level decisions regarding beef cattle movement and trade during the COVID period. Instead, minor adjustments were made to address the demand changes.

Implications

The findings imply that adopted policies that facilitated the implementation of biosecurity bubbles and the movements of animal transport workers for breeding facilities and abattoirs during the COVID period were effective in normalising farm-level operations.