Canadian Beef Producers Now Competing With Australia

Australia has become a competitor for Canadian beef producers.

 

Michael Young is president of Canada Beef.

 

"Traditionally, it's been just the Americans that we competed against but since BSE the Australian sector has moved into the grain fed category and they've since fully developed it," he said. "We run into them everywhere. They put a good product in the box. We need to compete against it, there's nothing wrong with it but there are attributes, sort of emotional and functional attributes, that are associated with Canadian beef that are appealing to some of the markets that we're in."

 

Young spoke last week in Brandon at Manitoba Beef Producers' AGM.

 

He also talked about how the reduction of the swine herd in China due to African swine fever is opening up opportunities for other protein sources, such as beef.

Video: How the corn-soy diet transformed swine nutrition

At the 2026 ASAS Midwest Section meeting, Dr. Robert Easter, professor emeritus of swine nutrition at the University of Illinois, spoke at the U.S. Soy sponsored Swine Application Symposium, offering a historical perspective on one of the most important developments in modern pig production: the corn-soybean meal diet. What today is considered a foundational feeding strategy was not always obvious or even accepted.