Europe's beef market should see a medium-term recovery in demand while supply will mostly stay low, ensuring that livestock producers continue to receive firm prices through to 2009, the European Commission said today.
Following the recent scares over mad cow disease and foot-and-mouth, beef consumption was forecast to rise to 7.35 million tonnes this year, up nine percent against 2001.
This trend would continue through to 2009, when demand was seen at 7.54 million tonnes, according to a report issued by the Commission's directorate-general for agriculture to update its medium-term forecasts for the EU until 2009.
"The recovery in beef meat consumption is confirmed in 2002, with an increase that is expected to reach 9 percent compared to 2001," it said. "As production remains relatively low...average producer prices remain at a relatively high level.
"Lower production together with the quick recovery in beef meat consumption and the impact of the special measures taken in 2000 and 2001 indicate that the balance of the EU beef market is not likely to worsen in the next few years," the report added.
The EU's available net beef production was forecast at 7.67 million tonnes in 2004, compared with 7.45 million for 2003 and 7.44 million last year, the figures showed.
Further ahead, output would fall slightly as the beef production cycle reached its minimum by 2005/06 at around 7.56 million tonnes. It would increase slightly to 7.64 million tonnes by 2009, the Commission said.