They will primarily be targeted at arable or land that can be cultivated and not land in permanent pasture.
“Permanent pasture is grazed by native breeds like Herefords that produce high-quality protein from pasture, sequester carbon in the soil and do not release carbon through land being cultivated,” he says.
The society is working with the Farms Cutting Carbon Toolkit to educate farmers how to reduce their carbon footprint, to quantify the carbon sequestering values of permanent pasture and show livestock farming has a role in reducing greenhouse gases.
Roberts is in New Zealand for the World Hereford Conference.
During the week the 130 participants based in Queenstown alternated between conference presentations, visiting Central Otago studs and taking in the sights including a cruise on the steamer Earnslaw across Lake Wakatipu to Walter Peak Station for the formal conference dinner.
On Wednesday they visited the Campbell family’s Earnscleugh Hereford Stud near Alexandra and the Brown family’s Locharburn Stud near Cromwell. After the conference they will visit other South Island studs.
Roberts says beef farmers are relatively relaxed about the UK leaving the European Union because they still have a market of 68 million consumers to underpin prices.
To try to cement their future the society is launching a consumer brand-recognition programme for Hereford Beef.
“If we don’t have brand recognition it is difficult to tell people that we have got a high-quality product,” he says.
They are meeting those running NZ’s Hereford Prime marketing programme to learn how they have established what Roberts calls a clear, understandable brand that means quality beef.
The society is working with a UK public relations food marketing company and society secretary David Deakin says a host of meat quality awards in recent years proves UK Hereford beef has a story to tell consumers.
“The quality is there. It is just that the brand recognition needs to improve.”
The programme will not be based on nationalism or promoting a native British breed of cattle but on meat quality from animals that have been fed grass.
Deakin says the debate in the UK between veganism and red meat has put pressure on the red meat industry but the society is countering it by saying if consumers eat less red meat then when they do they should eat quality Hereford beef.
“They will still have the same disposable income. We say spend it on quality Hereford beef,” he says.
The society is also active on social media correcting false claims and accusations from critics of red meat or the farming of animals and will engage with them.
The society has about 1000 active breeders who each year register about 9000 calves.
Roberts says the average herd size is relatively small with the largest running 250 registered cows but several have more than 100. In the last 10 years the use of Hereford bulls over commercial cows in the UK has increased 90%.
He farms near the city of Hereford close to the Welsh border running about 60 cows, of which 35 are pedigree Hereford, and about 100 others.
Roberts also farms broiler chickens and grows crops and fruit for cider production.
He sees logic in the potential conflict between farming chickens and beef.
“Everybody eats white meat once or twice a week so when it comes to the weekly treat meal I want it to be UK Hereford beef.”
