Sheep farmers in Devon should not fear competition from New Zealand lamb, the NFU has said.

NFU livestock chairman Thomas Binns, who has just returned from a five-day trip to the Land of the Long White Cloud, said farmers in New Zealand had as much to fear from low prices as farmers in Devon and the rest of the UK.

During his visit he met farmers' leaders, the NZ Minister of Agriculture and lamb exporters, in a bid to avoid a repeat of this year's fiasco, when a glut of New Zealand lamb sparked a collapse in market prices in the late spring.

His assessment is that the sheep industry in New Zealand is facing major problems, with climate change, drought, a sharp reduction in numbers of breeding ewes with production expected to be down by around two million lambs this season, and growing pressures for environmental regulation, and that New Zealand sheep farmers are as anxious as British ones to keep the market strong.

"We have taken this to the highest level in New Zealand, and I was very encouraged by the willingness of everyone we met to work with us in finding solutions that will avoid a repeat of this year’s market disruption," he said.

"Partly because of that, and partly because of the very real problems the New Zealanders are facing, focused around climate change, I believe that sheep farmers in New Zealand have as much to fear from low prices as sheep farmers in England and Wales.

"This was only the first of what will be an ongoing programme of meetings and other contacts. We will be meeting with NZ trade and farmer representatives at Anuga, Cologne, in October, and taking it on from there."