THE Australian goat meat industry is experiencing growth as consumers look to the animals as being a source of lean red meat.
Goat meat also has low content of fat, cholesterol and saturated fatty acids, and is an acceptable meat across religions.
While Australia is a small producer of goat meat, it remains the world’s largest exporter.
This is partly due to free trade agreements that support the exports into key markets like the United States, the Republic of Korea and in recent months, China.
In fact, China is now one of the primary destinations for Australian goat meat.
Within Australia goats are a profitable enterprise but there is low demand for the meat domestically.
The result is the industry exporting most of its meat products.
Compared to cattle and sheep, the global goat population increased by 19.3 percent between 2006 and 2016, while the former grew by 6.7 percent and 6.8 percent respectively.
According to ABARES the carcass price of Australian goat meat has fallen since June 2022 and this has been attributed to an increase in supply of goats from Australia and the United States.
Increased global demand, however, has the potential to increase goat meat exports, stabilise prices and support the long term growth of the domestic goat industry.