August 8, 2012
Asia's meat demand to lift Australian feed grain exports
In the near future, Asia will have to buy more feed grain from Australia to supply the increasing meat consumption, according to analysts.
There are predictions that Asia will need around 100 million tonnes more feed grain - about five Australian wheat crops - over the next decade.
Meat trader and market analyst, Dean Smith, from Melbourne, says it's because middle classes in countries like China are getting wealthier.
"China, you know, we're talking about 30 million tonnes of increased meat demand - beef, pork and poultry - that's not even aquaculture, and the rest of the region - Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines - you're talking about an extra five million tonnes of meat demand over the next 13 years," he said.
"You need grain to produce that meat and we're talking about 106 million reasons why you should be a farmer."
