Meat plant- value for money?

[Gladys]

To add:

The primary function of farming should be to feed the local population which is also consistent with sustainability.  To base your business strategy around exporting produce whilst importing the very same items is just mad.   Feed the home market, the surplus is then exported, that surely is basic common sense, is it not?  Particularly when the export business requires a subsidy from the home population to make it 'viable'.

As I said above, the Creamery seems to have got it right, feed the local population, use the surplus (both produce and revenue)  to create new products for export and you create a virtuous circle and actually create a 'product'.

Is there anywhere off island that proclaims 'Manx meat' either on its shelves or menu? 

[TheTeapot]

With the inevitable arrival in the next few years of shite american toss, there is an opportunity for farmers to market their produce very well. Done right manx meat could be right at the front of that.

[Peter Layman]

1 hour ago, pongo said:

Economies of scale?

Tommyrot, they could charge a little extra for all the meat they export and let locals have it a lot cheaper.

[Peter Layman]

1 hour ago, pongo said:

Economies of scale?

Tommyrot, they could charge a little extra for all the meat they export and let locals have it a lot cheaper.

[Gladys]

7 minutes ago, TheTeapot said:

With the inevitable arrival in the next few years of shite american toss, there is an opportunity for farmers to market their produce very well. Done right manx meat could be right at the front of that.

Definitely, after the local population has been fed. 

[Peter Layman]

1 hour ago, Gladys said:

To add:

The primary function of farming should be to feed the local population which is also consistent with sustainability.  To base your business strategy around exporting produce whilst importing the very same items is just mad.   Feed the home market, the surplus is then exported, that surely is basic common sense, is it not?  Particularly when the export business requires a subsidy from the home population to make it 'viable'.

As I said above, the Creamery seems to have got it right, feed the local population, use the surplus (both produce and revenue)  to create new products for export and you create a virtuous circle and actually create a 'product'.

Is there anywhere off island that proclaims 'Manx meat' either on its shelves or menu? 

Given the amount of money the government throw at them, we should be the first they look after. I recall years ago that butchers used to line up at Smithfield to get hold of Manx meat. Pretty much the same at Stanley meat market in Liverpool

Edited July 9, 2021 by Peter Layman

[Annoymouse]

So having read the article on Manx Radio about the creamery defending its practises and trying to shit on the other two smaller independents. How on earth does IOM creameries get away with loading their cartons of milk/cheese products into unrefrigerated vans, to start delivery say midnight onwards for the products to be sat outside premises until 6am at the earliest, typically 8am for offices? would the milk really pass any sort of quality testing after being at ambient temperature for 6-8 hours, is that not ample time for bacteria?

 

 

 

[Andy Onchan]

10 hours ago, Peter Layman said:

Given the amount of money the government throw at them, we should be the first they look after. I recall years ago that butchers used to line up at Smithfield to get hold of Manx meat. Pretty much the same at Stanley meat market in Liverpool

That's because it was cheaper. I recall about 25 years ago you could buy (at retail) Manx lamb joints cheaper in Liverpool's meat markets than on Island. 

[John Wright]

11 hours ago, Peter Layman said:

Tommyrot, they could charge a little extra for all the meat they export and let locals have it a lot cheaper.

 

10 hours ago, Peter Layman said:

Given the amount of money the government throw at them, we should be the first they look after. I recall years ago that butchers used to line up at Smithfield to get hold of Manx meat. Pretty much the same at Stanley meat market in Liverpool

 

8 minutes ago, Andy Onchan said:

That's because it was cheaper. I recall about 25 years ago you could buy (at retail) Manx lamb joints cheaper in Liverpool's meat markets than on Island. 

If they charged more in UK it wouldn’t sell. So it’s sold at a low price subsidised by Manx tax payers.

The issue with Manx Meat is typical of what happens when government interferes in the market and encourages over production.

The FMA was brought in during the 1930’s to guarantee good prices for farmers and supply for islanders. The abattoir owners and butchers were running a ring. Farmers got low prices, couldn’t make a living. 

Prices were pegged to prices at UK sales.

But the way it’s developed from a producers organisation/coop into a government owned and operated facility has got out of control.

There isn’t, and probably never can be, sufficient throughput to cover the cost of slaughter and butchering of carcasses at a reasonable price to consumers. Plus livestock can be sent off island and sold elsewhere and get a better price. So throughput reduces and the per carcass cost on a capital and revenue basis increases, losses increase and cost to consumers goes up.

up until 1980 FMA had a solution. There was a canning plant and the surplus was made into Manx tinned stewed steak and mince. There wasn’t the money to update the plant.

[pongo]

11 hours ago, Gladys said:

Definitely, after the local population has been fed. 

I strongly suspect that premium produce, great branding, solid marketing and added value is the only scalable way ahead for a small place like this.  Target the sort of market where people pay more for a picture of the farmer on their sausages.

Live exports should be permanently outlawed. Before that inevitably becomes an issue which undermines reputation.

[TheTeapot]

Pongo gets it.

It's not just the marketing with a picture of a farmer though, it must be represented in reality. The brexit nonsense is aalost certainly going to lead to lower standards, here on Island our standards need to be the absolute highest possible. Then it isn't just marketing.

I sort of get the 'economies of scale' argument given for shipping them away live, but 4 hours on the Ben in a truck on the car deck is morally shit behaviour, and you'd get 5 times as many dead cows in the space taken by live ones. 

[John Wright]

33 minutes ago, TheTeapot said:

Pongo gets it.

It's not just the marketing with a picture of a farmer though, it must be represented in reality. The brexit nonsense is aalost certainly going to lead to lower standards, here on Island our standards need to be the absolute highest possible. Then it isn't just marketing.

I sort of get the 'economies of scale' argument given for shipping them away live, but 4 hours on the Ben in a truck on the car deck is morally shit behaviour, and you'd get 5 times as many dead cows in the space taken by live ones. 

Fully agree live stock export must be banned.

However that means we have to resolve the conundrum that the livestock gets a better price in Northwest marts than here and the processing price per carcass across is only 25% or less of what it is here. The disproportionate slaughter cost of smaller abattoirs isn’t just IOM. Most small, local, abattoirs have closed due to the price of processing each carcass being too high compared to super abattoirs. 

At the moment the farmer gets more by exporting live and selling slaughtering in England than exporting dead stock. Even after transport costs.

[SleepyJoe]

DEFA surely has to produce position papers on all areas within it's remit with policy recommendations for the next programme for government?

To me meat & dairy production subsidy are an utter waste of public money but Tynwald has to make policy decisions for the public good & that of the planet

[TheTeapot]

22 minutes ago, John Wright said:

Fully agree live stock export must be banned.

However that means we have to resolve the conundrum that the livestock gets a better price in Northwest marts than here and the processing price per carcass across is only 25% or less of what it is here. The disproportionate slaughter cost of smaller abattoirs isn’t just IOM. Most small, local, abattoirs have closed due to the price of processing each carcass being too high compared to super abattoirs. 

At the moment the farmer gets more by exporting live and selling slaughtering in England than exporting dead stock. Even after transport costs.

It's another minor marketing point in the 'ethical' treatment of animals - local slaughter, not had to go more than 30 miles.

[Boris Johnson]

I would not mind paying a premium for Manx meat but it is not as good as it used to be 20+ years ago, what happened?