
Meat Board announces new conditions for sheep export

The Meat Board of Namibia announced an additional condition to the Sheep Marketing Scheme. The aim of the move is to offer sheep producers a competitive local carcass slaughter price under the ‘New Export Permit Condition’ which will be implemented on 1 June.
This comes after sheep producers saw substantial price differences between Namibia and South Africa (Namibia’s only sheep export market) since the implementation of the Sheep Marketing Scheme.
According to the Meat Board, the condition implies that both producers and abattoirs have a joint obligation to share the costs of the value addition in Namibia.
A price difference of N$2.50/kg has been set, whereby should the Namibian export abattoir offer a carcass price to the producer differing with N$2.50/kg or less from the South African Abattoir reference price, an export permit will not be granted to the said producer, meaning that the sheep will be slaughtered at the local Namibian Export abattoir.
However, the Meat Board stressed that should the Namibian export abattoir offer a carcass price to the producer differing with more than N$2.50/kg from the South African Abattoir reference price, an export permit will be granted to the said producer to export the sheep to South Africa to be slaughtered there.