Background

France has the largest cattle herd in Europe around 20,5 million head, and is second only to the USA as the world's largest exporter of raw hides. The cattle herd has fallen from more than 23 million head in 1979, to the present day figure, due mainly to falling numbers of dairy cows(-22%) following the introduction of milk quotas set throughout the European Union. At the same time there has been a movement away from traditional pastoral farming(extensive), and some 82,000 small farms carrying less than 20 cows have disappeared.

Over the last 15 years there has been more emphasis placed on efficiency and productivity, and thus the move to more intensive farming methods, often incorporating industrial feedlot systems. This has been good for grain quality improvement where there has been a parallel effort on parasite irradication (warble fly etc).

Did you know?

France is the third largest exporter of "salted" hides and skins in the world

11 countries make up 80 % of all raw exports

• USA : 1,92 billion USD
• Australia : 0,615 billion USD
• France : 0,412 billion USD

Ireland annual kill charts

Ireland has an annual kill(2007 figures) of around 1.7 million head of cattle(of which 21% cows). The bovine kill is steady. 2.94 million lambs and sheep were slaughtered in 2007 which is down 6% compared to 2006 and continues to show a slow down for the first 6 months of 2008.

The United Kingdom slaughtered around 2.60 million head of cattle in 2007 of which 434 000 cows. For lamb and sheep the figure for 2007 was 15.80 million head slaughtered, which is down from 2006 (16.39 Million, -3.50%).

Other UK Slaughter Statistics (DEFRA) can be found here.