Live animal exports – good or bad?

Cruelty toward animals is a no brainer, it is absolutely not acceptable behaviour in anyone’s book. If it is identified, there must be actions taken to correct the situation and, just as importantly, something done to prevent it from ever happening again. These actions may involve fines, penalties and gaol.

If the cruelty is identified in another country, Australians have little they can do about it, however.

Once again animals from Australia have been sent to another country and cruelty has been identified. This has resulted in yet another ban on live animal exports, this time to Egypt.

Those who are advocates against animal cruelty, and especially live animal export, are obviously very pleased that the ban has been put in place.

So is this live animal export a good thing or bad?

In this country, most people eat their beef after it is bought in the supermarket or local butcher. In the country many folk have home slaughter and the meat is stored in their freezers until needed, but the vast majority of us rely on the food industry to supply what we want, when we want it.

We have refrigeration and very good transport in Australia, so we are able to have the slaughter done in relatively central locations and then the meat held in storage, either during transport, in the shop or at home, until we cook and eat it.

In many countries this is a luxury they do not have. So animals are often slaughtered daily for the meat needed by people on that day and there is no cold storage and shelf life. The meat is slaughtered and eaten the same day in little towns and markets all over these countries.

This means that there needs to be a ready supply of live animals available to meet this need. Australian cattle are recognized worldwide as being of exceptional quality, so these countries really do want to purchase our stock.

On top of this is the matter of Halal. This is a religious requirement for those of the Islamic faith. The meat must have meet specific requirements to be considered Halal or suitable for those of this faith to eat. Many of the countries that have limited refrigeration are also heavily Islamic.

We have Halal beef in this country, however the process used here is not necessarily considered to be traditional by many of those Moslems from these countries, so they want to slaughter their animals in the orthodox way in their own countries.

Australia has a huge live animal export industry. There are probably a million cattle in northern Australia that are intended to be sent to these countries to meet the demand for Halal and the daily need for fresh meat. A ban of any sort on this trade has hugely significant impacts on not only individual farmers but towns in that area and the industry as a whole.

To reinforce this point, the ban that was imposed by the Australian government a year ago has resulted in the Indonesian government reducing the import of live cattle from Australia to a quarter of what it was previously. This is actually making some farmers start to think seriously about shooting their cattle instead of trying to sell them. Transporting and feeding them is costing so much and there is almost no market available for them to sell them in.

The industry is now asking the question, what impact will this latest ban have?

So is live animal export a good or bad thing?

There is no simple answer but it would seem that when the impact on a whole industry and the towns of far north Western Australia of not having the exports are considered, it is a trade that is essential to all of us.

The next question that needs to then be asked and answered if this trade is to continue, is “how can this country ensure that when our cattle are delivered to these other countries they are treated humanely and without any cruelty?” This is an immensely complex issue as it really involves state rights.

This whole issue of live animal exports has far reaching implications and is well worth watching.

This article has been written by Rachelle Williams – The Green Food Safety Coach.