Sacrificial lamb via an app

Commonly translated as the Feast of Sacrifice, Eid al-Adha is the second of the two major Islamic holidays, Eid al-Fitr being the other. It falls on the 10th day of the final month in the Islamic calendar with observances and celebrations generally occurring in the following three days. This year in the Middle East it falls between June 15 and 18.

The ritual of sacrificial slaughter associated with Eid al-Adha is called Qurbani and across the countries where it is practised the livestock involved are counted in the millions.

Traditionally, meat from the sacrificed animal is shared three ways among the originating family, friends and relatives and the poor. Cattle, camels and goats as well as sheep are all included in the ritual, but it would seem the focus is mainly on sheep and goats purely from a cost perspective.

Middle Eastern ride-hailing and delivery app Careem launched its first Udhiya/Qurbani service this year offering users local and regional sheep or goat with the meat home-delivered in 40-50 minutes.

Quoting from Careem, local Naimi, Najdi and Iranian Jaziri sheep (16-20kg) range from AED1600-1780 (dirhams) with local and Indian Cashmere goats (14-17kg) marginally cheaper at AED1200-1400.

At the current exchange rate, that converts to A$656-730 for a sheep and A$492-574 for a goat, which includes supply, slaughter, portioning, packaging and delivery to doorstep.

Careem is not alone offering pre-arranged Qurbani process through a grocery delivery platform; others including Noon Minutes and Botim have also embraced the initiative.

Careem began in 2012 as a ride-hailing app in Dubai. It became a very popular service across 15 countries in the Middle East and North Africa region and was subsequently bought out by Uber in 2020 for US$3.1 billion.

In April 2023, Uber announced a Careem offshoot with US$400 million investment from UAE tech holding company e& (previously Etisalat). Known as Careem Technologies, the offshoot now owns and operates all Careem's non-ride services under one super app. Uber continues to fully own Careem's ride-hailing business while maintaining a stake in Careem Technologies.

At first glance it seems a little odd that all these e-commerce players announced the same service at the same time but that may be because all are linked to the same Udhiya app in the UAE called Dhabayeh Al Emarat.

Developed several years ago to provide online slaughter, cutting and delivery services under registered trademark by Abu Dhabi-based livestock trader and abattoir manager Green Island, this app appears initially to have struggled as a stand-alone initiative for Green Island.

But a combination of factors since has brought new relevance to the Dhabayeh Al Emarat app. The e-commerce, direct-to-consumer approach spawned the quick home-delivery framework while increasing wealth and urbanisation of the population fuelled its popularity. Powering the delivery framework is an armada of low-paid migrant workers on scooters, who now have a 24-hour presence on the country's roads.

In separating those making the sacrifice from the process itself, the Udhiya/Qurbani service allows users to focus on the spiritual aspects of Eid al-Adha without getting involved in the handling and slaughter of livestock.

Meanwhile, physical markets and slaughterhouses are encouraging less customer participation. Sharjah Livestock Market this year introduced a pre-booking service for animal slaughter. Customers are notified when the meat is ready to be picked up or they can arrange for home delivery to avoid having to wait at the plant after selecting their animal. Slaughter fees for sheep and goats are AED15 (A$6) per animal.

The Udhiya/Qurbani service offered on the grocery-delivery platforms is an important development not only for Islamic countries where sacrificial slaughter is a religious tradition, but also for countries such as Australia who are involved in the live sheep trade.

Big gains in animal welfare have been made since the days of sheep being bundled into the boot of cars and the Udhiya initiative by the grocery-delivery platforms will serve to build on those gains.

AUSTRALIAN beef export processors would have welcomed news from their sales desks last week of a US5-6 cents a pound turnaround in the price of imported 90CL boneless and 85CL trim. Having faced a gradually easing market throughout May due to higher volumes of product from Australia and New Zealand, a tariff defying inflow from Brazil, ample frozen inventories in the US and uncertainty about US domestic lean beef values, Australian traders were no doubt expecting to see a continuation of buyer indifference and lower bid prices.

However, as Steiner noted, sentiment changed rapidly in the space of a week.

Against an expectation that domestic lean grinding beef values would start to adjust downwards towards a US345-350c/lb range, prices instead traded higher on tight supply taking domestic 90CL boneless to US360c/lb. Heavy feedlot weights were supposed to keep downward pressure on fed cattle values in June, but that also faltered. Wholesale beef prices headed north with Choice cutout up 3c at US319c/lb, the highest so far this year.

Meanwhile in Queensland, big numbers of very good cattle are being put to processors particularly from ticky areas of the Burnett, Central and North. This has provided a comfortable pipeline for processors with cover in some instances now out to the first week of August.

At the same time works are doing all they can to accommodate the flow, with Dinmore reported to have stepped up to 2800 each of its working days last week.

After earlier adjustments, rates were generally unchanged on Monday with YP ox quoted at 505-510 cents a kilogram and heavy cow at 420-440c/kg in southern Queensland.

In the south, market rates have changed little in the past fortnight, with the best of the heavy cows at Wagga on Monday holding 490c/kg (CW equivalent), far enough ahead to bring southern buyers up into Queensland clean country.