Slow west
Market Morsel
It has been a while since we took a look at the transfer via road train of sheep from WA to the eastern states. The last update was when the flows were peaked during May 2024 at nearly 166,000 over the month. The remainder of 2024 settled down to a more average pattern, as per the black dotted line that denotes the 10-year average seasonal monthly trend. As at the end of 2024 there was a total of 883,876 sheep and lamb transported from west to east, the second highest annual flows since our records began.
So far in 2025 the transportation to the east has been a little more muted with minimal flows seen over January and February, circa 7,500 head and 4,800 head respectively. However March has seen a bit of an uptick in the volumes with nearly 42,000 head registered sent out of WA. Despite the late quarter surge the total shipments for March still remain around 24% under the ten-year average flows for March.
On the current trajectory for quarter one, we are shaping up like a season from 2023, 2017 or 2013 that saw similar numbers sent to the east as at the end of the first quarter of the year. Assuming monthly flows for the rest of 2025 similar to the ten-year pattern would see annual totals end up between 375,000 to 425,000 head by the end of this year.
