Lamb threat to livestock sector
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by Karen Miles
• Livestock hauliers reeling from the beef crisis are preparing for another international setback with the threat of a block on this summer's lamb exports to the Continent.
Around 2,500 lorry loads of sheep could be landlocked unless a ferry operator sets up a livestock service to carry the estimated one million sheep across the Channel between June and October.
1TE, the last ferry company to operate a cross-Channel livestock service, suspended its sailings in March when the BSE crisis ended UK beef exports.
The Road Haulage Association is in discussion with the company but dues not seem optimistic that the service will be resumed by next month.
International livestock hauliers could be reduced to transporting small numbers of sheep from farms to home markets and abattoirs as farmers leave herds on the hills to graze until the autumn or next spring, says the Meat and Livestock Commission.