Nascon Media, the publishers of Beef Central, have this week launched their second major Australian livestock industry website, Sheep Central.

And we’re hoping you can help us spread the word.

The move means that our business now has both major red meat species covered with a dedicated daily online news service, written by some of Australia’s most experienced agricultural journalists.

Sheep Central (click here to access) is the first and only online daily news service dedicated solely to Australia’s wool, lamb and sheepmeat industries.

Why Sheep Central? The reasons are really exactly the same as those that led to the launch of Beef Central in 2011, and which has since gone on to attract 50,000 regular readers.

Firstly, there is a global shift occurring from traditional print news platforms to online news. Agriculture, faced with distance, remoteness and transport challenges, is ideally suited to the rapid dissemination of important industry information via the web.

Secondly, existing rural media services in Australia focus on particular States or agricultural regions, while attempting to cover a broad suite of commodities. We have long felt that a need existed for dedicated, targeted rural news services that specialise in covering single commodity areas in greater detail, using specialist, well-connected writers to deliver the depth of news, content and perspective that readers deserve and need in their daily business decision-making.

Like Beef Central, Sheep Central’s daily news service will be written by some of Australia’s most experienced livestock industry journalists and commentators, focussing on nothing other than writing the news that matters to sheep and wool industry stakeholders.

Editor Terry Sim has a deep connection with the sheepmeat and wool industries across Australia, and has gained widespread respect from industry stakeholders having worked as a specialist sheep and wool writer in print media for the past 15 years. He is also an active sheep producer in his own right, running a flock near Macarthur in Victoria.

Become a free subscriber

While it’s true that many Beef Central readers are focussed specifically on cattle and beef, we know that there is also a very large sub-set of readers, especially in southern states, whose business interests span beef, sheepmeat and wool. For readers in that category, we’re hoping you can help us.

Like Beef Central, Sheep Central will be free for readers to access and use, both online and via regular emailed news headlines alerts.

If you like what you see on Sheep Central, please consider registering as a free subscriber for our regular news alerts, using the green “Sign up today” panel towards the bottom of the Sheep Central Home Page. Alternatively you can click here to register as a free Sheep Central subscriber.

We’re also asking that you pass on the Sheep Central web-link to your friends and colleagues across the industry using the “Share this site with a friend” function on the Sheep Central website’s right-hand column.

We hope readers get as much value from Sheep Central as you frequently tell us you do from Beef Central.

James Nason and Jon Condon
Publishers – Sheep Central and Beef Central.