Dear transport and cheap skins hit sheep returns

AFTER a week of little movement in the lamb trade, prices opened marginally lower on Tuesday.

The factories quoted 406 and back to 400 cent/kg (145p to 143p/lb) as a base price Tuesday, with some prices unchanged from last week but others as much as 6 cents/kg (2p/lb) lower.

It’s a hard hitting season for sheep farmers, who continue to question the wide gap between Irish prices and the return of 460 cent/kg for Irish lamb on the French market.