04/21/05 Sheep producers could have a good year

The way Stan Boyd sees it the stars have all seemed to aligned in the right way. Boyd is executive director of the Idaho Woolgrowers Association and he thinks that 2005 will be a good year for sheep and lamb producers despite continuing imports from Australia. BOYD "A low dollar here therefore Australia has more benefit to send there lamb into Europe. They can exchange those Euro dollars for more Australian money than they can by exchanging US dollars." Now that Australian dumping has ended Boyd says the US sheep and lamb numbers are starting to build back. BOYD "Most of these are sold, many of them sold on a forward contract even before they were born." Like so many other The sheep industry in Idaho today is nothing like it was 70 years ago. BOYD "Ten percent of the industry we were at the end of the 1930's. There was over 2.7 million sheep in the state of Idaho. Today that number is down to 265 thousand head in Idaho and about four million nationwide. The Idaho sheep and lamb value as of early last year was over 32 million dollars. Voice of Idaho Agriculture Bill Scott