Stone the crows, we've been eating Aussie beef.
Supermarkets have even been selling it cheaper than its Kiwi-grown competitor.
A spokeswoman for supermarket giant Progressive Enterprises said the Australian-owned company had sourced a special shipment of quality Australian beef which it sold at special prices through its national store chain for the past two weeks.
"It was a good opportunity to have a good price point for our customers," she said.
The meat had country-of-origin labelling and met the standards set by Progressive Enterprises, which operates Countdown, Woolworths and Foodtown supermarkets.
The spokeswoman said while Progressive Enterprises usually sold New Zealand meat as its first choice, like other retailers it brought in some of the Australian beef as a one-off special.
On Friday, the Otago Daily Times visited three Dunedin supermarkets operated by Progressive Enterprise and Foodstuffs, but the chillers did not contain any Australian beef.
The chief executive of the New Zealand Beef and Lamb Marketing Bureau, Rod Slater, said it was not unusual for Australian beef to be sold in New Zealand supermarkets.
That had been happening this winter because drought had caused a cattle shortage.
Typically, about 7000 tonnes of imported Australian beef would be consumed over about a five-week period, mostly in the North IslandHowever, it was likely that figure would double this year, such was the shortage.
Each year, New Zealanders consume 115,000 tonnes of beef.
In another move driven by the shortage, North Island beef processors have been paying 30c to 40c a kg above market rates for cattle from Otago and Southland.
The cattle are then trucked north to supply the Auckland market.
Mr Slater said that too was driven by the cattle shortage.
Beef and Lamb New Zealand is forecasting the export beef kill for the coming year will be 2.25 million, a drop of 3.9% on last year due to lower beef cow numbers caused by the drought and land-use change.
