AMERICAN farmers have recommended president Donald Trump apply tariffs of around 30 percent be applied to all imported lamb and sheep meat.

In a weekly address on 20 March, R-CALF USA chief executive officer Bill Bullard has outlined a request to US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick to increase tariffs on imported sheep meat to US$1.25 a pound.

Australian trade analysis indicated that setting tariffs at this level would equate to a 30pc tax on today’s mix of lamb carcase and cut volumes shipped to the US – 85,132 tonnes in 2024.

The suggested tariff would mean an 8pc tariff on Australian lamb racks, but would most affect shoulders with a 35pc hit, and it comes in at about 28pc on legs.

“Where it would hurt is on low price big volume items – the lower the price the bigger the impact,” one analyst said.

“It would end up favouring high value items and it would force low value items into other markets, but that would still be at a cost to Australia because those other markets would be a step down (in price).

“Based on 2024 shipments and volumes that US$1.25 a pound amounts to close to a 30pc duty across the board.”

One analyst expected that Australia would be vehemently opposed to a flat type of tariff on sheep meats of that size.

R-CALF CEO Bill Bullard.

Mr Bullard’s address ‘Will Tariffs Arrive in Time to Save American Lamb?’ comes less than two weeks before Mr Trump has forecast applying tariffs on ag products coming into the US from 2 April.

Mr Bullard said the formal request to the highest levels of the Trump government to take immediate action had been made “to save what’s left of our all-but-destroyed sheep industry and to reverse its alarming decline.”

“We’ve asked U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick to review the domestic sheep industry and to adjust the debilitating imports that have broken our domestic market and that are destroying America’s critical food production infrastructure.”

However, Mr Bullard said if lamb imports were stopped today there would not be enough lamb meat in America to meet America’s appetite for this important protein.

“That’s because we’ve let global importers capture a full 70pc of the American market.

“So, we need a phased-in approach to begin rebuilding our domestic sheep infrastructure without causing shortages for American consumers,” he said.

“And that’s what we’ve proposed.

“We provided Secretary Lutnick with a schedule for the gradual reduction in imported lamb over a 10-year period to incentivize investment and expansion in our domestic sheep industry while ensuring lamb remains on America’s menu.”

Mr Bullard said the secretary has been asked to increase tariffs on all lamb and sheep meat to $1.25 per pound.

“This proposed $1.25 per pound tariff represents an increase from zero tariffs that currently apply to the flood of cheaper imports coming from Australia.”

Episode 3 analyst Matt Dalgleish tweeted on X recently that the US sheep industry has been in decline since the 1990s. He said tariff policy changes in the 1999/2001 period did not help support it and led to higher prices for US consumers, decreased consumption of sheep meat from all sources and triggered a World Trade organisation challenge to imports that ultimately failed, he said.

Mr Dalgleish said Australia was not sending lamb to the United States to the deliberate detriment of the sector.

“We filled the gap (in production) due to their industry’s decline.

“It’s all about politics and nothing to do with fact.”

Factors in the decline in US lamb production include the impact of predatory animals, product quality and higher price compared to Australian lamb, and competing land uses.

“There are a whole range of factor, but to say that we are responsible for it, as Australia, is just rubbish.”

Prime Minister Albanese today said Australian officials continued to engage constructively with with the Trump administration.

“We were engaged over the weekend in some of those discussions that are taking place.

“My ministers are engaged, our people in the United States are engaged as well,” he said.

“We’re advancing Australia’s national interest as you would expect.”