Despite ongoing industry and government efforts to reduce trade barriers, which have led to improvements over the past three decades, an array of red meat tariffs, safeguards, quotas and technical barriers still limit Australia’s access to several important markets around the world.

A new report developed by Meat & Livestock Australia will provide regular updates on how Australia is tracking within key beef and sheepmeat safeguards and quotas.

In recent years, Australia has been a high user of EU beef and sheepmeat quotas and Japanese beef and beef offal safeguards.

Critically, Australia has hit the expanding Korean beef safeguard limit for the last four years and is on track to do so again in 2018.

Moreover, during peak herd liquidation in 2015, Australia maxed out the US and Canadian beef quotas.

Once a safeguard or quota is fully utilised, temporary (often trade prohibitive) tariffs are applied, rendering the market less attractive for trade. The timing of when these safeguards or quotas are triggered can have ramifications in Australian cattle and sheep markets and, hence, are important to monitor.

The new Global Quota and Safeguard Tracker report can be viewed on MLA’s website here