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National Game Dealers Association statement on lead free ammunition


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At the National Game Dealers Association ( NGDA) annual general meeting members voted to commit to sourcing all feather and fur Game as well as venison and wild boar from lead free supply chains from the 1st of July 2022.

This was agreed in order to future proof the sale of Game meat in their customers businesses, and to ensure continued consumer growth from those people seeking to enjoy our healthy delicious game products. This is a positive move for our industry to protect the environment and further assure our products in a highly competitive market place. The NGDA and its members will be working with the relevant industry groups to ensure, with this notice, our supply chains are able to make a transition.

If you have any concerns as a supplier to an NGDA member, please discuss your individual requirements with them or the NGDA.
https://www.nationalgamedealersassociation.co.uk/

 

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Had you seen this?

image.png.376d20d2a5a7c890043154075fce8bab.png

BGA UPDATE: NGDA Announcement on Lead

 

Dear Derek, 
  

This morning the National Game Dealers’ Association has announced that its members will no longer be accepting lead-shot game from July 2022.  The British Game Alliance is ready to support its shoots and its registered processors through this important transition.

The British Game Alliance supported the shooting sector’s commitment to a five year phase-out of lead, announced in early 2020, precisely because the stockists and retailers of BGA Assured Game were telling us that they would not tolerate lead-shot birds for long. We therefore welcome the leadership the National Game Dealers’ Association (NGDA) has shown today, providing a clear timeframe for this transition for all shoots supplying game into the commercial food chain. 

We are consulting with supermarkets, the NGDA, our Advisory Committee drawn from across the shooting sector, BGA Shoots and our registered game dealers, to put in place systems and protocols to support our community through this change. We anticipate different BGA Shoots will have different needs and different responses to the announcement, and we will not be pushing any one solution. We remain committed to the five year phase-out, while supporting both the NGDA and the stockists of BGA Assured Game who need a lead-free product. 

There will be concern among many of our stakeholders today, and we are here to listen and respond to those concerns. But the reality, as we have discerned from multiple conversations with major retailers, is that the NGDA’s customers simply do not want lead in their products, and the market for lead-shot game is set to dwindle. I would also like to highlight the opportunities. We have heard from many stockists that the ceiling for game meat is so high, if only we can source a BGA Assured, lead-free product. The NGDA announcement allows us to press home the health and environmental qualities of game, as a sustainable, lean, locally-sourced and quintessentially British meat. This is a message that major retailers are ready to hear and amplify.

We have no doubt that the future of game meat is a BGA Assured, lead-free supply chain, and that is what we intend to deliver for the part of our sector that supplies the commercial market. But we remain an organisation delivering Shoot Assurance to every part of the shooting community, to shoots large and small, creating a self-regulatory shield that will safeguard all our futures. Our commitment to self-assurance accessible to all will not change as we seek to support those enterprises moving to a lead-free model. Our mission has always been twofold, to protect our members through self-regulation, and to boost the consumption of game. A consumer of game is the surest friend of game shooting, and supporting the transition to lead-free is the surest way to increase our number of friends.


All the best,

Liam

Liam Stokes
CEO

 Clearly this is extremely important news to those of you involved in game shooting and to the shooting industry in general.

 

Keep well and safe.

 

John

 

John Cullinan

Membership Secretary

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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As Conor well knows I am totally against a complete lead ban as it is simply not necessary. This has been shown in deer world where the vast majority of stalkers will comply voluntarily with using non-toxic when needed. This probably has a lot to do with having to put a traceable ticket on a carcass so anyone not complying will soon be found out.

Absolutely no reason why birds could not be tagged with the registered number of a shoot, in fact for food traceability this would be another positive. Tags are cheap enough for even small shoots to comply. With this in place the change would come from within the shooting community.

Just because I choose to eat game and venison shot with lead I would not wish to impose this on anyone not comfortable with it. Indeed if more folk were to eat game and venison because it was known not to contain lead that would be a huge positive. I will fight for my right to choose what I shoot with for my own personal consumption,  I am extremely disappointed that BASC et al will not do this on my behalf.

I am quite happy to use alternatives to lead when meat is going in to the food chain and there is a disconnect between shooter and consumer.

Why BASC et al could not have produced a statement along these lines rather than their ill thought through, crass, catch all statement effectively stating that all lead should be banned and attempting to impose this on their own community is beyond me. Alienating everyone not a 12g or 20g game shooter was not smart. It highlighted that BASC's main agenda is for game shooting, they seem to have forgotten their roots.

 

 

 

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15 hours ago, Conor O'Gorman said:

At the National Game Dealers Association ( NGDA) annual general meeting members voted to commit to sourcing all feather and fur Game as well as venison and wild boar from lead free supply chains from the 1st of July 2022.

This was agreed in order to future proof the sale of Game meat in their customers businesses, and to ensure continued consumer growth from those people seeking to enjoy our healthy delicious game products. This is a positive move for our industry to protect the environment and further assure our products in a highly competitive market place. The NGDA and its members will be working with the relevant industry groups to ensure, with this notice, our supply chains are able to make a transition.

If you have any concerns as a supplier to an NGDA member, please discuss your individual requirements with them or the NGDA.
https://www.nationalgamedealersassociation.co.uk/

 

No comment.

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Surely this only impacts on you if you sell what you shoot?

I eat what I shoot and will continue to use lead. 

This seems to be becoming a very cosy arrangement for commercial shooting and lots of 'jobs for the boys'. 

Or am being wound up as it is 1st April and this would make a good April fool!

 

 

2 hours ago, Salopian said:

Had you seen this?

image.png.376d20d2a5a7c890043154075fce8bab.png

BGA UPDATE: NGDA Announcement on Lead

 

Dear Derek, 
  

This morning the National Game Dealers’ Association has announced that its members will no longer be accepting lead-shot game from July 2022.  The British Game Alliance is ready to support its shoots and its registered processors through this important transition.

The British Game Alliance supported the shooting sector’s commitment to a five year phase-out of lead, announced in early 2020, precisely because the stockists and retailers of BGA Assured Game were telling us that they would not tolerate lead-shot birds for long. We therefore welcome the leadership the National Game Dealers’ Association (NGDA) has shown today, providing a clear timeframe for this transition for all shoots supplying game into the commercial food chain. 

We are consulting with supermarkets, the NGDA, our Advisory Committee drawn from across the shooting sector, BGA Shoots and our registered game dealers, to put in place systems and protocols to support our community through this change. We anticipate different BGA Shoots will have different needs and different responses to the announcement, and we will not be pushing any one solution. We remain committed to the five year phase-out, while supporting both the NGDA and the stockists of BGA Assured Game who need a lead-free product. 

There will be concern among many of our stakeholders today, and we are here to listen and respond to those concerns. But the reality, as we have discerned from multiple conversations with major retailers, is that the NGDA’s customers simply do not want lead in their products, and the market for lead-shot game is set to dwindle. I would also like to highlight the opportunities. We have heard from many stockists that the ceiling for game meat is so high, if only we can source a BGA Assured, lead-free product. The NGDA announcement allows us to press home the health and environmental qualities of game, as a sustainable, lean, locally-sourced and quintessentially British meat. This is a message that major retailers are ready to hear and amplify.

We have no doubt that the future of game meat is a BGA Assured, lead-free supply chain, and that is what we intend to deliver for the part of our sector that supplies the commercial market. But we remain an organisation delivering Shoot Assurance to every part of the shooting community, to shoots large and small, creating a self-regulatory shield that will safeguard all our futures. Our commitment to self-assurance accessible to all will not change as we seek to support those enterprises moving to a lead-free model. Our mission has always been twofold, to protect our members through self-regulation, and to boost the consumption of game. A consumer of game is the surest friend of game shooting, and supporting the transition to lead-free is the surest way to increase our number of friends.


All the best,

Liam

Liam Stokes
CEO

 Clearly this is extremely important news to those of you involved in game shooting and to the shooting industry in general.

 

Keep well and safe.

 

John

 

John Cullinan

Membership Secretary

 

An April Fool I wonder??

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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4 hours ago, 243deer said:

As Conor well knows I am totally against a complete lead ban as it is simply not necessary. This has been shown in deer world where the vast majority of stalkers will comply voluntarily with using non-toxic when needed. This probably has a lot to do with having to put a traceable ticket on a carcass so anyone not complying will soon be found out.

Absolutely no reason why birds could not be tagged with the registered number of a shoot, in fact for food traceability this would be another positive. Tags are cheap enough for even small shoots to comply. With this in place the change would come from within the shooting community.

Just because I choose to eat game and venison shot with lead I would not wish to impose this on anyone not comfortable with it. Indeed if more folk were to eat game and venison because it was known not to contain lead that would be a huge positive. I will fight for my right to choose what I shoot with for my own personal consumption,  I am extremely disappointed that BASC et al will not do this on my behalf.

I am quite happy to use alternatives to lead when meat is going in to the food chain and there is a disconnect between shooter and consumer.

Why BASC et al could not have produced a statement along these lines rather than their ill thought through, crass, catch all statement effectively stating that all lead should be banned and attempting to impose this on their own community is beyond me. Alienating everyone not a 12g or 20g game shooter was not smart. It highlighted that BASC's main agenda is for game shooting, they seem to have forgotten their roots.

 

 

 

My thoughts exactly, and why I will continue to use lead when the birds are for my own consumption. 

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3 hours ago, grahamch said:

Surely this only impacts on you if you sell what you shoot?

I eat what I shoot and will continue to use lead. 

This seems to be becoming a very cosy arrangement for commercial shooting and lots of 'jobs for the boys'. 

 

 

 

 

As stated, there is a good market for game, but the sort of people who go to Waitrose to buy their game, don’t want lead ( even trace elements ) in it, which is fair enough. 
It is big business. If that business dwindles and dies through a lack of demand, then driven shooting ( both commercial and not ) will dwindle and die. Think about it. 

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Having spoken to a couple of shoot owners this morning about game cover work, they are, rightfully asumming that the price of birds in the feather shot with steel will a least be worth considerably more than in the past (being there is such a huge market.) and should in the short term not effect there margins to much. 

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20 hours ago, Scully said:

As stated, there is a good market for game, but the sort of people who go to Waitrose to buy their game, don’t want lead ( even trace elements ) in it, which is fair enough. 
It is big business. If that business dwindles and dies through a lack of demand, then driven shooting ( both commercial and not ) will dwindle and die. Think about it. 

It won`t be big business for much longer,they`re busy putting nails in each others coffins! They wont have game to sell in a shorter time than many seem to think imho.

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14 minutes ago, matone said:

It won`t be big business for much longer,they`re busy putting nails in each others coffins! They wont have game to sell in a shorter time than many seem to think imho.

I totally agree !! It seems to me there is actually nobody or organisation prepared to fight tooth and nail for shooting now they all have to link it in with some other cause to save the world 

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Ah.. but now the NGDA have painted themselves in to a corner.. as i said early two shoots we do gamecovers for are now expecting top prices and everything taken no excuses not the usual "We'll take em but can't give you owt" OR as in one case they had to pay the dealer to take them (50p a brace). Or possibly a very big own goal.... 

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When I ran a shoot over 20 years ago, we used to get rather more money for game than is given now (and costs were lower as well in those days), but even then, the sale of game was only a very minor part of the overall income.  Back then it was common for game to be sold from town centre fishmongers and butchers in the fur/feather as well as oven ready.  In our local town there would have been at least 3 outlets that I can remember selling game. Now there are no outlets selling game (as far as I know anyway) - no one wants the hassle of plucking and cleaning - and income from game sale is near enough zero I imagine.  Our shoot is very small and we eat or give away all we have.

The problem is that at the end of the day, demand is quite limited, supply is very abundant (in season) and labour costs to produce a supermarket shelf product are high.  All perishable goods have a high 'margin' to cover the need to accept the wastage caused by short life (which may well be much less than a countryman would accept).

I can't see the price of game rising at all - let alone significantly if you can claim 'lead free' status.

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7 minutes ago, JohnfromUK said:

I can't see the price of game rising at all - let alone significantly if you can claim 'lead free' status.

 

9 minutes ago, JohnfromUK said:

The problem is that at the end of the day, demand is quite limited,

That is not what the BASC etc. and NGDA are saying, they say there is a huge market out there from Waitrose etc. premium product, premium prices. They will need reminding of this in October 2022. Having been in farming all my life you become very cynical of all these promises, the producer takes all the risk and then get shafted at the point of no return. NFU, BASC, CLA etc. do not actually represent there member any more. Believe half of what you see, and nothing of what you hear.. is what i was told 35 years ago. Becarefull what you wish for. 

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1 minute ago, 8 shot said:

That is not what the BASC etc. and NGDA are saying

If they are right, very good, but I can't see it myself.  I used to be a producer (running a shoot) and we always got a much better price very early in the season (if I remember right £3 a brace wasn't unusual early season - which fell away rapidly in November and might be 50p a brace after Christmas).  Reason given; limited demand, over supply from the big shoots.

I used to aim to 'balance the books' without any game sales - and if we did get a few decent cheques, it was a bonus.

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11 minutes ago, 8 shot said:

 

That is not what the BASC etc. and NGDA are saying, they say there is a huge market out there from Waitrose etc. premium product, premium prices. They will need reminding of this in October 2022. Having been in farming all my life you become very cynical of all these promises, the producer takes all the risk and then get shafted at the point of no return. NFU, BASC, CLA etc. do not actually represent there member any more. Believe half of what you see, and nothing of what you hear.. is what i was told 35 years ago. Becarefull what you wish for. 

Sadly all vert true,I fail to see just who the Orgs think they are representing anymore,other than themselves.....and those against us.

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Right then, lets fast forward January 2023 we've all done as asked given up lead, been charged extortionate amounts of money for an inferior cartridge after being told they're cheaper to produce , game larders/ chillers full to bursting. Oh...Game dealer not answering the phone. No game birds in anywhere in your niche market shops, NO change !  Febuary / March  "BASC, NGDA join statement" What we now need to boost game sales is a Game assurance scheme, similar to Agricultures  "RED TRACTOR" for traceabliity and confidence in are product. we want every game shoot registered an inspected annually by "Quailfed inspectors" working for BASC/NGDA  won't cost much, £3/£4K a year. AND WE GUARANTEE sale of all your game at premium product prices.

You can see where Im going.

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With more and more people going 'meat free' and more considering releasing game to shoot is 'cruel' .......... I really can't see to whom they are going to sell all of this game?  Despite some changes over the past 12 months due to people being at home more - in general the move is to convenience foods.

Maybe there is a market for 'convenience' game?  ready made casseroles, pies, possibly curries, burgers?  Possibly there is - but can it command a sufficient premium over farmed chicken, lamb, beef, pork? 

I would not be investing my hard won in such a venture.

Personally, I think that game will always be a bit of a niche market - which is fine for the shoots like ours where we can eat (or at peak times freeze and give away) all we get.  But for the 'big shoots' producing maybe 1000 brace or more a week at peak .......... I can't see it.

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20 minutes ago, 8 shot said:

Right then, lets fast forward January 2023 we've all done as asked given up lead, been charged extortionate amounts of money for an inferior cartridge after being told they're cheaper to produce , game larders/ chillers full to bursting. Oh...Game dealer not answering the phone. No game birds in anywhere in your niche market shops, NO change !  Febuary / March  "BASC, NGDA join statement" What we now need to boost game sales is a Game assurance scheme, similar to Agricultures  "RED TRACTOR" for traceabliity and confidence in are product. we want every game shoot registered an inspected annually by "Quailfed inspectors" working for BASC/NGDA  won't cost much, £3/£4K a year. AND WE GUARANTEE sale of all your game at premium product prices.

You can see where Im going.

The end of Commercial Game Shooting?

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