Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster, Ron Hays, is talking with Oklahoma State University Extension Livestock Marketing Specialist, Dr. Derrell Peel, about beef demand and more.
Beef demand looks resilient, Peel said, as he has been closely watching for signs of weakness or trading down over many months.
“If you look at the highest valued middle meats, the things like tenderloin, they have been pretty flat this year, not declining, but not going up,” Peel said. “We don’t expect them to go up in the summer. Seasonally, this is not the strongest time of the year for them.”
Looking at some of the other middle meats that are favorable for the grilling season, Peel said those have shown improvements lately. While beef demand may be flat seasonally following July 4th, Peel said, as a whole, he does not see any signs that beef demand has weakened significantly.
“We are at relatively high levels,” Peel said. “In fact, we are nearly at record levels from a retail price standpoint.”
Internationally, Peel said the trade situation is responding as one would expect given the transition in the market conditions. Beef exports are off, Peel said, as they began to weaken in the last few months of 2022.
“They have been down now on a monthly basis for seven months in a row on a year-over-year comparison,” Peel said.
Beef production is falling, Peel said, and prices are relatively high, which adds to headwinds for beef exports.
Peel also talked about hay production in Oklahoma.
“We have had so much rain here recently in Oklahoma that maybe there are some questions of quality issues, but I think we are clearly making a lot more hay and pasture and getting ourselves in better shape,” Peel said. “That will really be the key, I think, to this transition to heifer retention in particular.”
As we move toward the end of the year, Peel said, it is more likely that we will see confirmed signs that we are beginning to retain some heifers and rebuild from the drought.
“We have been dealing with high feed cost, the high cost of gain particularly at the feedlot level, and that filters back into feeder cattle markets,” Peel said. “It does look like we have a decent potential to see some relief in that.”
Most recently, Peel said the corn market is beginning to react to variable weather conditions in the Midwest and there is potential for some impacts there.
“There will be a lot of dynamics in that market, it won’t be clear for a while, but I think all in all, the prospects are that we see at least some relief if from a feed standpoint, from a cattle and livestock perspective on these feed prices,” Peel said.
The Beef Buzz is a regular feature heard on radio stations around the region on the Radio Oklahoma Ag Network and is a regular audio feature found on this website as well. Click on the LISTEN BAR for today’s show and check out our archives for older Beef Buzz shows covering the gamut of the beef cattle industry today.
