Sheepmeat is popular in Malaysia compared with neighbouring countries and there appears to be room to move, as Australia is the dominant supplier in the import-reliant market.
Beef is the most favoured meat in South Korea and lamb is a limited meat choice, but it is a fast-paced market where food trends are quickly embraced.
Sales general manager Shane Kingston has just returned from a fact-finding visit to the Asian markets for red meat opportunities.
He said the trip was to reconnect with existing partners in Malaysia, understand the latest market trends in both countries and explore new opportunities, particularly in South Korea.
"One of the things that struck me with both markets is the resumption to pre-Covid-19 behaviours.
"While there were still masks in public areas in Korea, the general public behaviour was one you would expect to see pre-2020."
He said that gave the Alliance team confidence there would be sales growth in both markets.
Tourists returning to Malaysia were also bringing a high level of spending, particularly to its islands and Kuala Lumpur.
The challenge would be to move quickly, as Australia had zero tariffs starting next month.
A significant sheepmeat business to Malaysia was constrained by only one of Alliance’s five plants having market access and meeting strict criteria beyond halal killing.
Mr Kingston said they would work to add more plants to the access list.
"The opportunity of marketing remains significant when you get the sense there’s about 40,000 tonnes of lamb and mutton imported into and consumed in Malaysia on an annual basis, and the majority of that comes from Australia at the moment."
Alliance could see a strong Australian presence in both countries with marketing investment in food service and retail outlets.
"They are taking a determined approach to this which is something, as we get deeper and deeper into our plans, we must be ready to take on the challenge."
Its work to "grow the pie" might involve trying to access some of the Australian share or finding new opportunities through its own programmes as about one third of Malaysians were buying lamb on a monthly basis.
The Malaysian population was growing, spend per consumer was increasing with inflation and unemployment was relatively low, compared with the rest of the world at the moment.
Koreans were also free spenders, dining out for meat as often as once a week and beef was consumed twice a month on average.
Korean-style barbecues were a firm feature of its dining culture and there were about 74,000 meat specialty restaurants nationwide.
The lamb market was still new and relatively small but gaining traction as Koreans were keen to try new and different cuisines.
Mr Kingston said said there was a good level of wealth in South Korea and an emerging young professional population dining out regularly, while online sales of meat had grown almost 70% in 2020 for a $US7.3 billion ($NZ11.3 billion) business.
While lamb did not perform a big role there at the moment, lamb specialty restaurants performed strongly.
"Korea is all upside as we have nothing there today so it’s all upside in how we build that market and grow partnerships."
He said Alliance would likely take a multi-channel approach to South Korea and food service would play a significant part as the dining experience would ultimately be replicated at home.
Its intention was to have a balanced geographic footprint for meat sales without an over-reliance on major markets such as the United States, United Kingdom or China, to reduce any risk.
