The Weekly Grill

This week, Weekly Grill podcast host Kerry Lonergan turns up the heat on consumer behaviour and marketing expert, Stockyard's Lisa Sharp.  

Australian young cattle and slaughter cattle prices have continued to descend during the first half of 2023. In this week's podcast, regular markets commentators, RMA's Chris Howie and Ep3's Matt Dalgleish face the big questions: Are we at or near the bottom of the price cycle? What impact will the forecast drier winter have on cattle supply and demand? Are processors going to be able to cope (lab...

TAKE a look in any supermarket retail chilled cabinet, and it's evident that value-added meat products are rapidly soaking up space previously devoted to basic chilled, packaged beef and lamb.   Around the world, time-poor householders are increasingly looking at more convenient heat-and-serve and ready-to-eat meals. One of the pioneers in the value-added further processing industry in Australia,...

New South Wales beef producer George King's views expressed in an opinion piece on carbon published on Beef Central back in March attracted an extraordinary level of reader comment.   Mr King, who also joined the board of the new Cattle Australia board representing the grassfed cattle industry in December, sat down with Weekly Grill podcast host Kerry Lonergan last week to chew the fat.  

Angus seedstock breeders are gathered in Tamworth this week for their annual conference, and in this week's Weekly Grill podcast, host Kerry Lonergan caught up with Angus Australia president Erica Halliday. Erica talks about the challenges and opportunities facing Angus cattle and beef in Australia, progress in objective measurement of an ever-widening list of production, fertility and meat qualit...

IN this week's episode, 88-year-old beef processing industry veteran Allan Teys reflects on his experiences stretching across seven decades in the red meat and livestock industry. Weekly Grill host Kerry Lonergan digs deep into the industry's eventful past in this interview with Mr Teys, who before retirement headed the Teys processing business for more than 35 years and represented the industry a...

In this week's episode, Weekly Grill host Kerry Lonergan turns up the heat on MLA international markets manager Andrew Cox, with a focus on Australian red meat's Free Trade Agreements. Australia is drawing closer to start under the new agreement with the United Kingdom, and steady progress is taking place behind the scenes over a new trade agreement with the European Union. It is widely anticipate...

This week's episode continues an occasional  showcase series on interesting pieces of emerging ag technology. Weekly Grill host Kerry Lonergan points the microphone at AirAgri's James Diamond, who has developed a personal location finder device with high workplace safety implications for agriculture. The mobile app based technology works in conjunction with an iOT tracking device to ensure farmer...

Goats used to be the supplementary commodity that 'helped pay the annual boarding school fees' for many livestock operators in western regions. Then the market for goats soared to record highs during COVID, before crashing spectacularly over the past six months. Where does the goat market go  from here? Is international demand in recovery? Have goat numbers bred up after the drought to the point o...

Beef Central's US-based monthly columnist Steve Kay, publisher of US Cattle Buyers Weekly, sits down to chew the fat with Weekly Grill host Kerry Lonergan in today's podcast episode. After 12 months of severe drought, US beef production and numbers going onto feed are now in rapid decline, as herd rebuilding starts to occur as northern hemisphere conditions start to warm up. What is it doing to pr...

Australian young cattle and slaughter cattle prices have continued to descend since our opening markets summary podcast with regular commentators, Stockco's Chris Howie and Ep3's Matt Dalgleish  back in late January. Two months on, are we near the bottom of the price cycle? Is there still a way to go? What impact will the forecast drier winter have on cattle supply and demand? Are processors going...

Big changes are sweeping the Australian grainfed beef industry, and today's episode of the Weekly Grill podcast captures some of the big trends evident in Beef Central's current Top 25 Lotfeeders industry analysis. Join Zoetis's Andrew Hallas and Beef Central's Jon Condon, as they sit down with podcast host Kerry Lonergan to explore the big trends in the industry, and what's driving them. The reve...

This week's Weekly Grill podcast focusses on Highland Beef Pastoral Co, a unique Australian certified grassfed beef supply chain targetting the United States  home-delivery beef market. As principal Murray Richardson explains, Highland Beef - somewhat unusually - was 'reverse engineered', in that the large US customer was found first, and the supply chain built around it. The business now manages...

This week’s podcast features an interview with Australian Beef Sustainability Framework chair and Central Queensland beef producer, Mark Davie. “Through the CN30 initiative, our industry defined a problem and set about investing in research and development to address the challenge, informed by drivers of industry productivity and cost,” Mr Davie says. “Because of this initiative, we are now leadin...

This week's podcast features an interview with live export industry pioneer Dr Rick Trivett.   As the head of Austrex, Rick has ridden the peaks and troughs of the Australian live export industry, pioneering trade into Southeast Asia, the Middle East and other parts of the world.

This week's podcast is an interview with the grassfed cattle industry's new boss, David Foote, chairman of Cattle Australia. The freshly-minted peak council has a big task in front of it, not the least being developing a viable funding model. It made a solid and popular start this week appointing Luke Bowen as the organisation's inaugural CEO. Mr Foote shares his early thoughts in the direction, p...

This week's podcast is an interview with Beef Central's veteran saleyards market reporter Murray Arnel, who retires shortly after a distinguished 45-year career watching the ebbs and flows of the southern cattle and sheep markets. Murray has covered store and prime cattle and sheep sales across Victoria, Tasmania and New South Wales since the late 1970s.  

Welcome back to the 2023 third series of Beef Central podcasts, the Weekly Grill, with host Kerry Lonergan. Today's second episode is a start-of-year assessment of the cattle and beef industry's state of health in 2023, and the issues at hand with MLA managing director Jason Strong. Among other topics, the pair discuss research and development, marketing and market access priorities for Australian...

Welcome back to the 2023 third series of Beef Central podcasts, the Weekly Grill with host Kerry Lonergan. Today's season-opening interview is a start-of-year assessment of the cattle and beef markets for 2023 with regular commentators, Stockco's Chris Howie and Ep3's Matt Dalgleish.   The pair discuss the 2023 year and what lies ahead: the dramatic adjustments in slaughter and young cattle prices...

Today's final 2022 Weekly Grill podcast with host Kerry Lonergan is an interview with Flinders + Co branded beef supply chain principal, James Madden. Flinders + Co created headlines in 2018 when it became the first meat company in the world to fully offset all carbon emissions from not only its own business, but every kilogram of meat it sold. What has happened since? The Weekly Grill podcast ser...

Today's Weekly Grill podcast with host Kerry Lonergan is an end-of-season wrap-up of the cattle and beef markets with regular commentators, Stockco's Chris Howie and Ep3's Matt Dalgleish. The pair discuss the 2022 year that was, and what lies ahead. One of the unexpected twists that took place this year was the brief, but dramatic drop in cattle prices around July, when cattle producers were spook...

MLA’s corporate chef Sam Burke has an infectious enthusiasm for all things red meat, and the endless possibilities in how best to enjoy it when cooking a quick mid-week meal for the family, or a long weekend lunch with friends out of the smoker.   Any reader who has attended one of MLA's big industry events has probably heard Sam speak, or indeed eaten his some of his great food. In this extensive...

The Weekly Grill headed to the feedlot industry's BeefEX conference in Brisbane last week, catching up with Darling Downs lotfeeder David Brown for an extended chat on the present challenges and opportunities in lotfeeding, plus a series of 'vox pop' responses from other lotfeeders attending the conference. David, a trained veterinarian who owns and operates the West Talgai feedlot near Allora, re...

Against a background of rising interest rates and international political uncertainty, agricultural financiers remain optimistic about lending in the Australian agriculture space, the Weekly Grill podcast host, Kerry Lonergan learned this week. In this episode, Kerry speaks with National Australia Bank's Khan Horne, who has monitored the industry's fortunes over 30 years.   The pair discuss the ou...

Global burger restaurant giant McDonald's has withstood the effects of the COVID pandemic better than many in the food service industry, with trade volumes well up this year in many countries. It has made the supply challenge ever greater for McDonald's global head of procurement, Andrew Brazier, even greater, he told the Weekly Grill's Kerry Lonergan in an interview yesterday at BeefEX 2022. The...