Farmers see no real gain during week of slow trading

There was a hint of weakening in the beef trade at the factories this week, but not a lot of evidence on the ground that it was being in any way effective on the returns to producers at least for the early days.

Supply has continued strong, and demand at the processing plants has eased with the Christmas orders in place — which leaves it a level field between producers and processors, each trying to hold command on prices on their side.

The result is that the quoted prices are unchanged at around 370 cents/kg base price for the steers with the processors now paying up to 375 cents/kg for a good percentage of the throughput, despite having tried their hand at reducing the price by a few cents/kg.