Figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics suggest that the number of agricultural businesses raising beef cattle increased by 4% between 2016 and 2021. However, over the same timeframe, the number of farms raising dairy cattle across Australia declined by 23%.

Meat and Livestock Australia, which promotes the country’s livestock farming and the red meat industry, said it had extracted the figures after analysing figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

It said there were an extra 1,811 businesses running beef cattle in Australia in 2021 compared to 2016. But there were 83,000 fewer dairy heifers (it described these as “the building blocks of a herd”).

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