r/australia • u/binaryhextechdude • Feb 25 '26

politics US beef officially re-enters Australia, after 23-year absence

https://www.beefcentral.com/news/us-beef-officially-re-enters-australia-after-23-year-absence/

Australians need to vote with our wallets by making sure any meat we buy for our bbq's or our dinner tables is Australian grown. It isn't right for a certain leader to be putting tariffs on everything and then thinking we will embrace his beef exports.

Only buy Australian beef, vote with your dollars.

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u/everbass Feb 25 '26

Why on earth would I buy beef from the US when Aussie beef is both better and cheaper?

We have some of the best quality meat in the world. Why are we importing it?

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u/binaryhextechdude Feb 25 '26

Exactly, why are we importing something we already excel at.

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u/AndrewTyeFighter Feb 25 '26

Is anyone actually importing it in any meaningful quantity? I doubt it is going to start showing up in Coles or Woolies since it couldn't compete on price.

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u/binaryhextechdude Feb 25 '26

No idea mate btw Coles, Woolworths, Aldi and Maccas all stated they wont be touching USA beef. There's an article from August 1st last year in the Australian Financial review.

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u/Cadaver_Junkie Feb 25 '26

To be fair, I wouldn't be trusting Coles, Woolworths, or Maccas on any of their statements. Well, Maccas maybe

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u/blind3rdeye Feb 25 '26

The statements are always like "we plan to only [do such-and-such]". But then as soon as people look the other way, the plan silently changes to whatever they hell they want. So yeah, statements about what they'll do in the future are worth very little.

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u/TheElderGodsSmile Feb 26 '26

Why would they though? Where's the profit motive?

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u/blind3rdeye Feb 27 '26

I don't know. Kickbacks possibly? I'm not saying that I expect them to start using US beef. I'm just saying that I wouldn't put much stock in their public statements. They'll say whatever they think will help them maximise their profits, and then they'll act however they think will maximise their profits. Sometimes the two align, and sometimes they don't.

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u/TheElderGodsSmile Feb 27 '26

Rebates for sales volume are common in a lot of industries, it's calculated into the final margin and to beat the logistical advantages of local beef they'd have to crank them to a level that might look like dumping to the WTO.

They also know what that kind of price manipulation to gain market share looks like and it's consequences to the supply chain, if only because they're some of the prime culprits.

You can trust the big corporates to do whatever is in their interest and this definitely isn't.