New markets on horizon for Mariental abattoir

Farmers Meat Market at Mariental has announced in a letter to producers that the export abattoir will be closed for maintenance work from 7 August to 4 September.Initially, the closure period was planned for 18 August to 4 September, but it has now been brought forward.The abattoir is a subsidiary of the Ohlthaver & List (O&L) Group and is currently the only abattoir in the country actively exporting lamb.Managing Director of O&L, Günther Ling, said 2022 and 2023 have been extremely busy years for them, especially for their producers, who delivered exceptional-quality sheep."Our primary aim has always been and will always be to attain the best markets for our producers and take Namibian lamb meat to new heights worldwide."Promising start Therefore, the company has approached potential markets in Europe, the United Kingdom, the Caribbean, and North America, while "we are eagerly awaiting on China / Namibia Ovine protocols to be completed and additional Halal Authority Audits to open the Middle and Eastern markets."Ling said they have greatly concentrated on the Norway market, which has provided a promising and good start, but has slowed down over their current summer season through September, with far slower offtake and significantly lower pricing offered by the market."It is therefore imperative for us to now start with our new markets," he said. "As we have previously indicated and booked, we required a shutdown period for maintenance from 18 August until the 4 September. As such, we have also planned bookings around these dates, with our final audit scheduled for the week of the 12 September."Capacity improvements Ling said with the additional markets of Europe and the Americas coming to life and having further new requirements, it has become essential for them to extend the dates. "This will give us much-needed time to do significant maintenance, improvements, upgrades, and investments in the plant. We intend to increase freezing capacity, replace scales, and do significant line and system maintenance. To this, we have also added additional audits for new markets as required."He said this will require cancellations and the movement of August bookings to September."Our team is busy with final schedules for the maintenance, and we will contact and start moving slaughter dates as soon as possible. We humbly call on your patience and support during this time as we get the abattoir in pristine shape, ready for a successful audit and new markets to create a stronger future and to enhance our Namibian lamb meat export trade."Marketing outlookIn March this year, Namibian Sun reported that the Farmers&#039; Meat Market expects to market 280 000 sheep by 2025, with several export markets coming into play this year.The abattoir closed in August 2020 due to low sheep availability but was then officially taken over by O&L through the Hartlief Group. Operations resumed in October 2020.The abattoir undertook its first trial run for export to Norway on 31 August last year.In November 2022, the abattoir received its recertification for export and slaughtered the first lambs. In January, the first shipment of lamb was on its way to Norway.The expected marketing number for this year is 50 000, of which the Norwegian quota alone makes up 40 000 lambs. Next year, sheep marketing at the abattoir is expected to increase by a whopping 170 000.By the end of January, the abattoir had already processed payments of N$10.9 million, excluding VAT, to 46 producers (on 30-day terms), with an average price of N$91.60 per kilogram.A total of 6 615 sheep were slaughtered, of which 48% were export lambs.

New markets on horizon for Mariental abattoir

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Namibian Sun 2025-07-21

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New markets on horizon for Mariental abattoir

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Namibian Sun 2025-07-21

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