1. Agricultural Systems and Food Production
Sheep Farming in Australia
A Case Study of a Pastoral System

2. Introduction
Australia is the world’s leading sheep- producing country, with a total of about 120 million sheep.
As well as being the largest wool producer and exporter, Australia is also the largest exporter of live sheep and a major exporter of lamb and mutton.
The sheep and wool industry is an important sector of Australia’s economy.

4. Characteristics and Location
Merinos, which produce very high-quality wool for clothing, make up 75% of the country’s sheep. Merino sheep are able to survive in harsh environments and yet produce heavy fleeces.
16% of Australia’s sheep are bred for meat production and are a mixture of breeds such as Border Leicester and Dorset.
The remaining 9% are a mixture of Merino and cross-bred sheep used for wool and meat production.
There are about sheep farms in Australia overall, carrying from a few hundred sheep to over animals.

5. Sheep farming in Australia – as a system
It is a classic example of extensive farming, which can be seen to operate clearly as a system.
Inputs:
The main physical input is the extensive use of natural open ranges, which are often fragile in nature.
Australia’s sheep farms are located predominantly in inland and semi-arid areas.
Human inputs are low compared with most other types of agriculture, with very low use of labour and capital per hectare.
Processes:
The main processes are grazing, lambing, dipping and shearing.
Output:
The outputs are lambs, sheep, wool and sheep skins.

6. Characteristics and location
Sheep farming in Australia occupies an area of about 85 million hectares, making it one of Australia’s major land uses.
New South Wales and Victoria are the two states that account for the largest share of the total value of sheep industry production in Australia
South Australia and Western Australia also accounting for a significant amount of production.

8. Climate map of australia
Australia’s sheep farms are located predominantly in inland and semi-arid areas.
Sheep production is largely confined to the southern, temperate regions of Australia.
Sheep are raised throughout southern Australia in areas of moderate to high rainfall and in the drier areas of New South Wales and Queensland.

9. Location of the system
In Australia, sheep and wool production occurs in three geographical zones:
high rainfall coastal zone
wheat/ sheep intermediate zone
pastoral interior zone.

10. The Pastoral Zone
About 25% of all sheep are farmed in the pastoral zone.
Sheep farming in Australia in general is extensive in nature but this type of agriculture is at its most extensive in the pastoral zone.
The overall farming input in terms of labour, capital, energy and other inputs is also very low – it is in fact the lowest input per hectare of farmland in the country.
Not surprisingly, farms can be extremely large.

11. The Pastoral zone
This is the arid and semi-arid inland area.
Here, summer temperatures are high, rainfall is low (less than 300mm) and the area is prone to drought.
Because of the lack of grass in this inhospitable environment, sheep are often left to eat saltbush and bluebush.
The density of sheep per hectare is extremely low due to the poor quality of forage.

12. The Coastal and Intermediate Zones
Coastal Zone:
Also called the high rainfall zone.
This zone receives more than 600mm of rain on average each year.
It carries 33% of Australia’s sheep flock.
Intermediate Zone:
Also called the wheat and sheep zone.
This zone is characterised by annual rainfall between 300 and 600 mm.
It extends over almost 35 million ha in southern and eastern Australia.

13. The coastal and intermediate zones
In the coastal and intermediate zones, the best land is reserved for arable farming, dairy and beef cattle and market gardening.
Sheep are frequently kept on the more marginal areas, for example on higher and colder land in the New South Wales highlands where more profitable types of farming are not viable.
About two-thirds of Australia’s sheep are on farms that support more than animals.
The smallest sheep farms are generally those on the better- quality land, where it is possible to keep many more animals per hectare than in the pastoral zone.

14. Sheep farming in Australia – type
Even though sheep farming in the pastoral zone may be mainly an extensive, pastoral system; many Australian farms are mixed-enterprise businesses, operating a combination of livestock and cropping operations – especially in the coastal and intermediate zones.
Not all of the farms are large-scale. Similar to the beef industry, there tends to be a large number of small-scale sheep farms in states like NSW and Victoria. In some instances the sheep enterprise on these farms is run as a secondary enterprise in conjunction with beef cattle or cropping, although small-scale sheep farms tend to be more specialised, rather than mixed-enterprise. Thus they may be more intensive.
Farm businesses which include a cropping enterprise tend to be larger in size, (either on the basis of the value of turnover or farm area) due to the scale-efficiencies associated with large-scale machinery used in these enterprises.

15. Farming Issues The main issues in Australian sheep farming areas are:
weed infestation, which is difficult to control on very large extensive farms that yield relatively small profits per hectare.
destruction of wildlife habitats due to sheep grazing, particularly in marginal areas.
the occurrence of periodic droughts that make farming even more difficult in low-rainfall areas.
soil loss from wind erosion and loss of soil structure – in some areas, this is transforming traditional ‘mainstream’ farming areas into marginal lands.
animal welfare, particularly in the most inhospitable environments where the low human input means that individual animals may not be seen for long periods.
increasing concern about the shortage of experienced sheep shearers.
Regarding the last point, many shearers have left the industry because of poor working conditions and the attraction of better-paid jobs in the mining industry and elsewhere. The number of experienced shearers fell by about a quarter between 2003 and A good shearer can shear up to 200 sheep in one day.

16. Conclusion
Sheep farming in Australia is a major user of land resources in a generally fragile landscape.
Changes in farming systems are required in some locations to address the issues facing the industry.
Failure apply such changes will result in the progressive decline in utility of the resource base for the sheep and wool industry.