Hogget pieces for sale in a butcher’s shop at £24/kg is not fantasy. In fact, it’s exactly what shoppers in Bristol are prepared to pay for the product.
This week has seen celebrity chef Andi Oliver featuring the culinary delights of Bristol, courtesy of her current BBC television series ‘Andi Oliver’s Fabulous Feast’.
Her focus throughout the programme was on sourcing produce of the highest calibre from suppliers operating within the Bristol catchment area.
When it came to the meat she wanted, hogget pieces were very much on the menu; they came with a price tag of £24/kg, supplied by a traditional butcher’s shop.
Two thoughts came flooding into my head on seeing the price tag on the tray of meat.
Firstly, consumers in the UK are obviously prepared to pay realistic prices for high quality food items.
Secondly, farmers are not getting their fair share of the monies coming in at the retail end of the food chain.
Retail value
Let’s be honest, hogget is not spring lamb. However, if the primary producer was to receive even half the retail value of the hogget now ending up on retail shelves, this works out at £12/kg.
At current exchange rates, this equates to almost €14/kg.
In truth, this is the sort of price that sheep farmers should be getting for their lambs and hoggets right now.
I remember when farm gate milk returns hit 50c/L a couple of years ago and some commentators suggested that the price was too high – consumers would be switched-off dairy altogether on the back of these ‘exorbitant prices.’
In reality, the polar opposite is the truth. Primary producer prices across all the agricultural sectors should be at least double where they are today, when assessed on the basis of farmers getting a fair return on their investment.
Every other sector of the economy works on the basis of a business factoring-in all raw material and labour costs plus inflation.
Supposedly, the monies available to farming courtesy of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is there to bridge the shortfall that exists between the farm gate prices actually available and the returns that primary producers need to survive.
As every primary knows only too well, it’s an approach to farm support that is not fit for purpose.
Farmers need to receive genuine prices for the food they produce, and this will only come about when genuine transparency becomes a reality within the entire farming and food chain.
