France has long been considered the market of choice for sheepmeat exports. While it returns a lower price than that commanded by domestic French lamb, it has remained the primary destination for Irish sheepmeat exports since the 1980s due to its large demand.

In recent years, growth in exports to high-value markets such as Scandinavia, Belgium and Germany marginally reduced the reliance on exports to France. The growth in value-added exports has also been experienced in France, albeit at a slower pace, with the traditional route to market of exporting in carcase form reducing. Nevertheless, it remains the most important destination for Irish sheepmeat, accounting for about 42% of exports in 2014 or some 18,000t.

Main market

The importance of the market and fact that France returns the highest price to its producers, often €1/kg higher than Irish prices, raises interest into what is happening on French farms. Add to the mix that breeding ewe numbers are on a downward trend, even though a support payment well in excess of €20/head has been introduced, and the appeal to get a glimpse of what is happening on French farms grows even stronger.

The winning producers in the Bord Bia Origin Green Beef Producer Awards recently got the opportunity to see first-hand how French farms operate. Their trip included a visit to sheep and suckler producer Philippe Touzain, who farms in Clermont Ferrand.

The farm is typical of lowland sheep producers in the region, with a greater focus on producing lamb for slaughter than other parts of France, where sheep dairying is the main focus. Land type is described as very good, but its potential is frequently limited by low levels of rainfall, with grassland management particularly hard to control in summer months.

Farm system

The farm comprises 91ha (224 acres), with 7ha (17.3 acres) used for growing tillage crops for home farm use. The sheep enterprise consists of a flock of 260 Suffolk ewes, split between early and mid-season lamb production, while the suckler enterprise comprises 42 suckler cows with progeny brought through to weanling stage.

Philippe works full-time off-farm but has help from his brother at key stages when there is a higher than normal labour requirement. Working off-farm has also led to a focus on labour efficiency, with the farming system also influenced by facilities: “The main difficulty is I have not enough housing. If I had more room, I could lamb more ewes early in the year to hit the Easter market or lamb all the mid-season flock indoors more comfortably.”

The early-lambing flock lamb in December, with the exact date influenced by when Easter falls. The production system is intensive, with early-born lambs finished indoors on concentrates. Ewes are housed in the final weeks of pregnancy with access to top-quality hay and home-mixed concentrate supplementation. Ewes are fed a rising plane of nutrition, with levels for twin-bearing ewes rising to 800g in the final two weeks of pregnancy. The diet is barley based at 60% inclusion and balanced with maize and a 30% protein product, which raises the overall protein content of the diet. Post-lambing, ewes are fed 1kg to 1.2kg depending on the number of lambs suckling. Lambs are weaned at about 60 days of age. This frees up room for a portion of mid-season lambing ewes requiring preferential treatment (triplet-bearing or ewes below target condition) to be housed. Lambs are offered access to creep feeding at three weeks of age, with feeding rates gradually increased to about 1kg per head and to ad-lib as lambs approach slaughter weight.

The average age of slaughter for single suckling lambs is 85 days or about 12 weeks, with twin suckling lambs drafted on average at 14 weeks. The farm has a relationship with a butcher buyer and a balance is achieved to obtain the optimum weight at slaughter to meet butcher specifications and limit the duration of the high-cost finishing system. Lambs are also traded under two premium brands with Labelle Rouge and Carrefour, one of France’s main retailers.

Barrier supervision

The sheep shed is straw-bedded, but differs from any commercial sheep shed I have seen in Ireland with head-locking feeding barriers. Philippe says that he installed these barriers as a flock management tool. “I use barriers once a day to control the flock. It allows each individual animal access to her own feed and not that of her neighbour and makes sure all animals can eat. All the attention can be on ewes and problems can be seen early by monitoring feeding. It also gives a chance to check all the lambs in the pen and helps to introduce them to meal feeding (while keeping ewes restrained).”

Creep gates are introduced at the back of the pen. Hay is also offered ad-lib with fresh hay given twice daily.

Mid-season lambing

The first of mid-season lambing ewes lamb from the middle of February and go to grass straight after lambing. A similar pre-lambing diet to the early-lambing ewes is fed, with early lactation feeding only continued if there is not enough grass to meet nutritional demand. Hogget ewes lamb outdoors along with a percentage of mid-season lambing ewes.

The breeding programme for a flock of 40 yearling hoggets differs to the mature flock, with Charmoise rams used for easy lambing and good lamb vigour at birth. Weather is generally not a problem for outdoor lambing, with the main threat being losses due to lambing difficulty or foxes.

Supervision is aimed at curtailing these losses, with sheep checked once from the evening until the following morning. Philippe says lambing difficulties are not excessive with mature Suffolk ewes, with ewes and rams on the farm possessing lighter bone than modern Suffolk breeding.

The focus is on achieving maximum performance from grass. However, as grass is hard to manage and often limited in summer months in times of low rainfall levels, targeted use is made of concentrate supplementation.

The aim is to have lambs sold off-farm by the end of September to build grass supplies for the ewe flock.

The farm is also part of a quality programme where there is an emphasis on improving farm productivity and increasing performance off grass.

Another notable feature is that each year the farm’s vet visits the farm and develops a dedicated health protocol to address any existing problems, but more so to put preventative practices in place to limit issues becoming established.

Profitability and plans

The average litter size across all flocks is 1.7 lambs per ewe to the ram, with 400 lambs reared from 260 ewes or 1.54 lambs per ewe. The average price received for lambs is €120, ranging from as high as €140 for early lambs to €100 to €110 for lambs sold during peak season supply. The mid-season lambing flock is more profitable than the early-lambing flock, but Philippe says he would be slow to move entirely to one system as having a year-round supply allows strong links to be maintained with customers and gives a more even cashflow. As mentioned earlier, housing is limited so it suits facilities and labour. Longer-term plans for the farm include investing in another sheep shed to allow mid-season lambing ewes to be housed. This decision is being weighed up and will be influenced by the potential for grant aid, with the existing shed built with 25% funding.

Philippe explains that sheep are the poorer relation to beef and dairy in terms of government support. The farm has a quota of 250 ewes for France’s sheep coupled payment, which yields about €8,000 per annum or €32 per ewe. Philippe says this needs to be increased in light of suckler cows receiving over €200 per cow of a coupled payment. He concludes that sheep farmers need stronger support and if this fails to materialise the downward trend in the ewe population is likely to continue.

Suckler system

The suckler herd is run on separate land to sheep for most of the year due to land fragmentation and lands closest to the yard being fenced for sheep. Calves are weaned at seven to eight months, with bulls averaging 400kg and heifers 350kg. Bulls are retained until 10 months before selling to specialised finishers or for export. Three Charolais bulls are run with eight replacements retained yearly. This ensures a young herd, but also takes advantage of the very strong trade for cow beef.