2023 – MLA year in review

By Jason Strong, Managing Director, MLA

There have been plenty of challenges and uncertainty in the livestock sector this year. Markets and weather dominating so much of the commentary.  While we are aware of the challenges and supporting the industry as best as we can, at Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA), we’ve also been busy telling Australian red meat’s good news story to industry and consumers, here and overseas. I wanted to quickly share with you what we’ve been up to this year and some personal highlights as I sign off as Managing Director at Christmas.

Australian Good Meat Summit

In March, MLA worked with the Australian Meat Processor Corporation (AMPC) and others to host an event called the Australian Good Meat Summit.

The purpose of this summit was to bring together industry leadership to hear the key messages from a series of research papers that were published in the journal, Animal Frontiers, looking at the positive contribution of red meat and livestock production.

The Good Meat Summit highlighted the important role red meat plays in our society and in human history and development. The Summit brought an Australian perspective to the growing body of scientific evidence around the world, highlighting the immense contribution of red meat towards our society.

Adoption outcomes

This year, MLA’s successful adoption program delivered $1.04B* in total net benefits to participating producers who adopted a new practice between 2015 and 2023.

During 2022-23 9.3 million sheep, 8.7 million cattle and 536,179 goats were positively impacted by practice change programs rolled out by MLA. Landholders participating in adoption initiatives were responsible for 157.5M hectares of Australian agricultural land. 

MLA's flagship programs for producers include Profitable Grazing Systems (PGS), Producer demonstration sites (PDS) and EDGE Network. These programs provide information on key management practices through supported learning packages (SLPs), peer-to-peer learning and workshops. 

MSA outcomes

The Meat Standards Australia (MSA) program delivered $259 million in estimated additional farm gate returns to MSA beef producers in 2022–23, a significant increase from the estimated high of $204 million in the previous year. Which brings approximately $1.8 billion worth of benefits since 2010.

Aussie Meat Trade Hub and international markets

Also in March, MLA launched the Aussie Meat Trade Hub. The Hub contains resources and services to assist with buying, selling and marketing Australian beef, sheepmeat and goatmeat across global markets.

We were also happy to host our annual Lambassador event in Victoria and several Aussie Beef Mate events in New South Wales and Queensland.

The Lambassador delegation in May immersed 19 chefs from all around the world in all things Australian lamb. This included farm visits, butchery demonstrations, cooking masterclasses, and exploration of Melbourne's vibrant food scene and local industry trends.

The Aussie Beef Mates delegations also brought globally acclaimed chefs and food professionals together to showcase Australian beef production. The groups visited beef properties, feedlots, state-of-the-art processing facilities, and top-tier restaurants across both states.

All these delegations were valuable partnerships between MLA and the respective State Governments.

NLIS, eNVD and myMLA

MLA is continuing to develop new digital tools for producers that help them deal with increasingly sophisticated supply chains. In July, Integrity Systems Company commenced a three-year project to develop a new and improved traceability platform to replace the 23-year-old National Livestock Identification System database.

Over the next three years, the data uplift program will modernise Australia’s data capture, storage, and distribution system for tracking livestock and their movements, helping industry and producers adapt to changing consumer and market needs into the future.

Launched at the MLA Updates in 2022, the electronic National Vendor Declaration (eNVD) app has continued to roll out to more producers. The app aims to increase adoption of digital livestock consignments – even when there’s no mobile connectivity.

We also relaunched the myMLA platform. The platforms contains quick access to MLA’s services, localised weather and news, and a gateway to all MLA tools and resources.

We also launched two new market indicators that cover online livestock transactions, one for the lamb market and one for the cattle market.

MLA Updates

About 350 producers attended this year’s MLA Updates event in Bendigo in November.

The Updates focused on Sustainability from Paddock to Plate and featured a range of engaging speakers, with highlights including presentations from Holly Kramer, who serves on the boards of Woolworths, Fonterra and ANZ.

The Updates also included practical demonstrations of drone mustering with the Sky Kelpie, a carcase breakdown with MLA chef, Sam Burke, genetics and livestock, and innovations in value-added products.

These examples are a sample of the outputs from programs MLA is working on make more and better information and solutions more readily available to all producers across Australia. We look forward to continuing this work in 2024.  

*calculated as net present value of adoption to 2045, discounted at 5% annually.