By Jane Han
Staff Reporter
Sarah Kim and her party of four indulged in six servings of beef at a casual downtown barbecue house in Seoul last week. With one serving at around 20,000 won, the bill came out to be a little over 140,000 won after adding side orders. What happened to post free trade restaurant beef prices? Nothing.
``I thought the price was supposed to drop because of all the fuss during the talks saying consumers will benefit from cheaper price tags on imported beef,’’ said 26-year-old Kim.
So did everyone else, but the situation hasn’t exactly kicked in.
Mid-class meat eateries sell one serving of imported beef anywhere between 18,000 won to 30,000 won, depending on which part. And when at fancy barbecues, expect to pay easily over 50,000 won per serving.
At a popular barbecue restaurant in the Gangnam area, ``hanwoo’’ (Korean native cattle) beef costs about 47,000 won per serving, while Australian imports go for around 30,000 won. The numbers on the menu show no change from months before.
While prices for restaurant goers aren’t friendly, distributors say that imported beef prices have certainly dropped.
``The price of Australian beef has dropped around 10 percent to 20 percent,’’ said an official at beef importer Jinmi. ``And it will probably continue to drop.’’
The price of Australian imports that were previously around 6,500 won per kilogram recently dropped more than 2,000 won, according to the National Agriculture Cooperative Federation.
He added that when U.S. imports actively kick into the market, it would become a competitive player, taking up about 40-50 percent of the market.
``U.S. beef quality is good _ much better than those from Australia _ and consumers will want to eat it whether it be purchasing it from the local grocery or ordering it at a restaurant,’’ the official said.
But for the price to take affect in restaurants, he said, it will probably take about two to three months since they want to keep their margins at a certain level.
``We’re at the bottom of the distribution chain,’’ agreed Lee Eun-tae, a Gangnam area restaurant owner. ``Before we get the product in our hands, it goes through so many channels and costs get added along the way, making it harder for us to present a more competitive price to our customers.’’
Another reason is the consumers’ concentrated demand for select products.
``The basic idea of supply and demand is applied here,’’ explained the beef importer. ``If one part, for example, a fillet, is popular, the price will go up _ regardless of whether it’s imported or not.’’
Restaurant owners have echoed that after the mad cow fiasco, the demand for ribs and sirloins have shot up due to their lacking for some time.
A recent Korea Consumer Agency survey of 1,000 respondents aged between 20 to 69 shows that the majority (55.8 percent) said purchasing imported beef is what they’re looking forward to most after the effect of free trade agreement (FTA) sinks in.
Observers related to the business say it’s understandable for consumers to want to see immediate price adjustments, but predict that changes won’t be too obvious for restaurant goers until the latter part of this year.