Cattle turn-off and beef production
There are two main avenues available to WA producers to turn-off cattle; that of live export or domestic slaughter. As illustrated by Figure 6, domestic processing accounts for a higher proportion of cattle turn-off than live export, however the margin between the two narrowed significantly in 2016. This may be partly due to a relatively poor wet season in early 2016 resulting in producers needing to reduce stocking rates. 2016 also saw very high prices offered for export cattle. This may have been driven by increased demand from Indonesia who increased the number of head imported from WA from 67 000 in 2015 to 157 000 in 2016.
During 2016, cattle slaughter accounted for 389 000 head compared to live export which accounted for 355 000 head- a difference of 10% compared to 55% in 2015.
Cattle slaughter
Historically male cattle slaughter in WA has been lower than female cattle slaughter as seen in Figure 7; however over the last five years the number of male and female cattle slaughtered domestically has converged. During 2014 the number of male cattle slaughtered overtook the number of female cattle slaughtered in WA and this further increased to a difference of 7% in 2016 where female cattle slaughter totalled 187 000 and male cattle slaughter totalled 201 000.
The declining female kill may be a result of herd building due to favourable market conditions.
Beef production
The majority of WA beef is consumed on the domestic market; however the proportion being exported to international markets has been on the rise in recent years. In 2016 domestic consumption accounted for 61% of WA beef production while 39% was exported to 30 overseas markets. This is up from 25% in 2012. The increase in the proportion of beef exported may be in part due to the implementation of recent free trade deals such as that with China, Japan and Korea.
