Six thousand Black Angus cattle chew on rolled barley, silage, cottonseed and molasses, fattening up in three rows of shaded pens under the hot Australian sun.
After an average of 90 days at the Gundamain feedlot, their weight can increase as much as 50 per cent to around 600 kilograms (1,323 lb), all to meet rising global demand for juicy grain-fed beef.
Gundamain is part of a structural change in the cattle industry in Australia, whose vast pasturelands and small population have made it the second-largest beef exporter, shipping meat worth $8.6 billion in the first nine months of this year, according to customs records.
The rise of feedlots is helping Australia supply beef more consistently for export and take market share from US exporters in Asian countries that prefer grain-fed meat.
The growth coincides with a contraction in the United States, the pioneer of feedlots and biggest producer of grain-fed beef, where years of drought have reduced cattle numbers to their lowest level since the 1950s.
Sales of Australian meat, seen as a close match for US product, are expanding to Asian nations that prize grain-fed beef for its marbling and quality.
Australian grain-fed exports increased to 324,421 tons in the first nine months of this year from 224,230 tons in the same period of 2020, according to government data that only includes beef from cattle fed for 100 days or more and therefore excludes some exports.
Most of this meat goes to Japan, South Korea and China. US exports to these countries have declined in recent years.
(Reporting by Peter Hobson; Additional reporting by Tom Polansek in Chicago; Editing by Sonali Paul)
