Flock data update

Sheep Producers Australia welcomes the ABS move to update the national sheep flock estimates through until FY2024.

Accurate, timely data is critical for benchmarking, profitability and informed decision-making, and this is something Sheep Producers Australia has advocated for on behalf of producers. 

This move by ABS helps address the information gap created by the disontinuation of the ABS Agricultural Commodities Survey.

Based on the information released by ABS on December 17, 2025 the new flock numbers are as follows

• 2021 - 70,790,232

• 2022- 73,101,442

• 2023 - 74,170,749

• 2024 - 71,359,243

Ths ABS informtion shows an annual decline of 2.4 per cent in the flock from 2022-2024.

Since FY2022, Meat Livestock Australia continued to deliver its regular market outlook and production reporting in an environment without an official national sheep inventory series.

To support industry visibility during this transition, MLA and Australian Wool Innovation established the Sheep Producers Intentions Survey (SPIS). 

SPIS samples 2,000–3,000 producers and collects data points aligned to those previously captured in the former ABS survey. SPIS has strengthened confidence in forward-looking signals, but it is not designed to function as a full replacement for a national agricultural census or official inventory series.