Saturday, March 30, 2024

Venison market in recovery, albeit slow

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New Zealand venison markets are in recovery as restaurants in Europe and North America get back in business.
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Deer Industry NZ venison marketing manager Nick Taylor says success with ground venison is now allowing companies to get shelf space for more items such as venison medallions.  

New Zealand venison markets are in recovery as restaurants in Europe and North America get back in business.

While positive, it is a slow recovery in a quite different world to the one in which marketers operated in 2019.

Silver Fern Farms (SFF) group sales manager Peter Robinson says the company is seeing a slow recovery in venison demand in traditional channels and growing demand in some of the new channels in which it has been investing, such as United States retail and China. 

“We expect to see this positive recovery continue into 2022, but what is really encouraging is the growth in new demand for venison,” Robinson said.

“It is this demand that gives us the best opportunity to build sustainable value for venison farmers.”

In Germany, the game meat season is going well even though the country is dealing with a fourth wave of the covid pandemic, with case numbers hitting new highs,” Deer Industry NZ (DINZ) venison marketing manager Nick Taylor said.

He says the high cost and limited capacity of airfreight out of NZ has meant less venison is being airfreighted to Europe, despite requests from some importers.

This has seen importers rapidly working through their frozen venison stocks, helping reduce inventory on the continent.

To drive retail sales in Germany, venison importers are running game season venison promotions including, for the first time since 2019, in-store tastings and events at supermarkets.

They are being supported by DINZ chef Shannon Campbell who has also been assisting with promotions in the UK, Belgium and Sweden.

Taylor says restaurants in Europe and North America are back in business, even if it’s a very different world to the one they operated in back in 2019.

The proportion of the German population with double vaccine shots is less than 70%.

In the US it is less than 60%, levels that are too low to stop the spread of the virus.

“Basically governments, restaurants and the public have recognised that since Delta can’t be eliminated, businesses and individuals have to decide what level of risk they are willing to accept,” Taylor said. 

“We have also seen restaurants shift to using more frozen venison in recent months to hedge their bets against supply disruption or lower numbers of diners.”

Restaurant table bookings in the US are now on a par with where they were at the same time in 2019. 

The US has also reopened to vaccinated tourists from around the world and cruise ship operators are seeing demand return.

Los Angeles is planning for 200 cruise ships in 2022, the highest number since 2008.

Venison marketers in the US are reporting good growth in sales of farm-raised venison through supermarkets and online.

US retail is a new channel for the industry and is one that has been a major focus of industry market development in the past 12 months.

“After a promising start, the companies are reporting a steady increase in sales and an expansion in the number of stores stocking their products,” he said.

The entry product has been ground venison, which is a format that consumers are familiar with and are confident to cook at home.

“Success with ground venison is now allowing the companies to get shelf space for more items, such as venison medallions,” he said.

Meanwhile, the usual drop in farmer returns for venison that follows the spring chilled export season is expected to be much smaller this year.

After reaching a peak of $7.10 a kilogram in October, average prices to deer farmers eased to about $6.90/kg in mid-November and are expected to stay around that level at least until the end of the year.

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