A nationwide campaign to encourage sales of British beef during the pandemic has resulted in a £9.8 million sales boost for the sector.
The Make It campaign aimed to address a carcase imbalance faced by meat processors in the Covid-19 crisis.
It was jointly run by levy bodies Quality Meat Scotland, AHDB in England, and Meat Promotion Wales.
At the time of the eight-week campaign, which started in May, processors blamed a “costly carcase imbalance” – caused by a surge in demand for beef mince and a decline in demand for high-cut values such as steak and roasting joints – for an overall drop in the retail value of a beef carcase and the price paid to farmers for their cattle.
Results from the campaign, which encouraged consumers to support the sector by buying locally produced steak to cook at home, reveal an extra 742 tonnes of beef steak were sold over the eight-week period.
Sales in Scotland represented 10%, or almost £1m, of the total sales boost.
In a joint statement, the levy bodies said: “As much of the nation returns to some level of lockdown and is likely to do so for the foreseeable future, we will apply the key learnings from the Make It campaign to look again at opportunities to collaborate together to ensure the red meat industry is protected.”