Mass 'unwanted' lamb cull looms

There is no export market for so-called 'light lambs'

Sheep farmers have renewed warnings that about two million lambs will be slaughtered because they cannot be exported due to foot-and-mouth restrictions.

It is unlikely the lambs, originally bred for markets in continental Europe, could be sold in Britain because adequate supplies are already available.

Farmers are hoping to persuade retailers to re-export New Zealand lamb to Europe to open up the British market.

But if this option fails the perfectly healthy animals will be destroyed.

Foot-and-mouth key facts

1852 confirmed cases

17,000 animals awaiting slaughter

3,548,0000 slaughtered

3,563,000 animals identified for slaughter

Richard Haddock of Farmers for Action told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "The big problem is that we have worked very hard over the last 10 years to build up export trade.

"We have done what the government asked and gone out to where the market is for this - France, Italy, Holland and places like that - and made a very good trade and brought in money for the Treasury.

"The big headache is due to foot-and-mouth.

"Unless we can persuade the major retailers to buy a lot more British lamb and the British public to support us, I honestly don't think we can eat this amount of lamb in this country."

Europe blamed

The farmers' problems are intensified because the animals involved are bred as so-called light lamb, to be slaughtered and eaten young, which is popular on the Continent, but not in Britain.

Mr Haddock said farmers' leaders had spoken to the authorities in New Zealand - a major provider of lamb to the UK - to seek a reduction in lamb exports to help Britain through this crisis.

But 70% of New Zealand lamb for this year is already in the country.

He said: "We are trying to talk the retailers into re-exporting it into Europe, where it can be sold at a profit and where there is a shortage at the moment."

Others have blamed the cull threat on the European Union's Common Agriculture Policy (Cap), which encouraged over-production.

Patrick Holden, of organic farming group the Soil Association, told the BBC: "The subsidies which have encouraged farmers to overstock with sheep have led to this massive surplus.

"Let's hope that the dreadful prospect of having to kill two million lambs for no market will encourage us to rethink the future of the Cap."