NBA beefs up its support for proposed levy increase

Published on Thursday 26 November 2009 20:54

THE turf wars being conducted over the proposed increase in levy by Scotland's red meat promotional body, Quality Meat Scotland, continued this week with the National Beef Association moving in to support the increase.

Chairman of NBA Scotland, Iain Mathers pointed out that Scotland's beef industry brought in almost 550 million a year and as such it had to be backed by a properly funded, central organisation.

"QMS works hard at making its 3.8m a year levy income cover a great deal of ground extremely effectively but without an income rise it will soon be forced to cut back on increasingly important activity."

The NBA said it was alarmed at what they called short-sighted calls by groups within the sector which seek either to focus a disproportionate amount of Quality Meat Scotland's shrinking resources on direct marketing, or others that challenged outright the need for approximately 90p per head increase in the slaughter cattle levy.

"It is nave to think that a business as important as beef is to Scotland can move forward without giving what is needed to properly fund QMS. Professionally run industries, with multi-million pound turnovers, should not quibble when asked to provide an additional 93p which is the equivalent of 0.5 per cent of the value of a typical Scottish slaughter beast," Mathers added.

The NBA referred to figures from the Chartered Institute of Marketing which showed that an average of 7.19 per cent of annual turnover is usually spent by the retail, or manufacturing, sectors exclusively on marketing.

"But QMS raises only the equivalent of 0.75 per cent of beef sector turnover through its levy and still manages to deliver promotional and development miracles on its behalf," said Mathers.