Price determinant factors to consider when buying or selling your heifers

Mhlupheki Dube

OFTEN, I get questions from prospective livestock farmers relating to livestock prices. The question usually appears simple but the reality is that it is difficult to answer satisfactorily because of the number of factors involved.

For many people who want to venture into livestock production the term livestock production almost always refers to beef production only when in actual technical terms, this refers to production of a wide range of animals from poultry to cattle.

Each time they ask how much heifers cost because they want to venture into production and they would need to buy their stock and they need to crunch the numbers into their spreadsheet. So, how much do heifers cost? I have also thrown this question to a number of my colleagues in extension services and the range of figures you get can be as different as night and day.

Since then I have come to realise that there are a number of determinant factors that contribute to the final figure and it is those factors that we need to unpack today so that next time you want to buy a heifer or sell it you know how to construct the price.

The first thing contributing to the price is location and in general terms cattle in most of Matabeleland area tend to have higher prices than similar animals in the Mashonaland areas. My theory of explanation regarding this discrepancy is that cattle has been the main source of livelihood in Matabeleland areas for a long time and hence animals in that region are relatively highly priced compared to other regions of the country.

This also covers other forms of stock such as goats which also tend to be expensive in Matabeleland. While in the Mashonaland areas there has always been other alternative sources of livelihood mostly anchored on crop production and hence the price tag that they have always to put on livestock has tended to be on the lower side.

Just recently I saw farmers advertising heifers on Facebook, one was around Mhangura in Mashonaland West and he was asking for something around US$450 while same breed and quality of heifers advertised by another farmer around the Nyamandlovu area of Matabeleland North was going for US$700.

Location can also be a factor with respect to livestock disease zones and in this regard livestock in red zone areas such as foot and mouth zones have always been on the low in terms of prices due to movement limitations and the direct slaughter only option.

Another important consideration in constructing a price for heifers, is the age factor. Are they weaner heifers, long weaners or bulling heifers? Obviously the older the heifer, the higher the price will tend to be because it will be nearer to production. Breed then becomes another important variable when discussing the price of the heifer and indigenous breeds will fetch lower than heifers with exotic blood such as Brahman crosses.

So it may be important to define what breed you are looking for or selling so that whoever is helping you decide the price can factor that into the equation.

Then there is the aspect of who is selling. People often forget to factor this important aspect into the consideration but it is very important.

Your seasoned livestock producers will almost invariably have a steeper price than the small players in the industry. There are a number of reasons for this but the most important one is that big players are not only selling you the heifer but they are also selling you their reputation such that when you buy from them you are almost certain that the product will measure up to its billing.

Finally, another important price determinant is whether it is being sold through an auction system or its just personal individual engagement with the farmer. An auction system tends to be expensive because of the competition among bidding buyers.

This is good news to the seller but certainly not to the buyer. I have attended heifer auctions around peri-urban areas of Bulawayo and the prices are almost always not for small boys.

So next time you want to sell or buy heifers you many need to consider the factors that have been shared to arrive at an appropriate price for the animals because while there is a generally known and accepted seasonality of beef producer prices, heifers are usually not affected by these fluctuations.

Uyabonga umntakaMaKhumalo.

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