Canberra push for livestock trade standards

Prime Minister Julia Gillard. Photo / Greg Bowker

Officials from Canberra and Jakarta will meet to set new animal welfare standards after Australia's decision yesterday to suspend all live cattle exports to Indonesia for at least six months.

The halt to the A$320 million ($400 million) a year trade came after huge pressure on the Australian Government after television footage of cruelty at Indonesian abattoirs.

The ABC TV investigative programme Four Corners showed cattle being whipped, gouged and beaten before slaughter, with experts concluding that some were still alive as they were dismembered.

"In light of the evidence presented to us, we have resolved to put a total suspension in place," Prime Minister Julia Gillard said. "We will be working closely with Indonesia, and with the industry, to make sure we can bring about major change to the way cattle are handled in these slaughterhouses."

But the Government faces mounting calls for a permanent end to all live animal exports, including sheep, worth more than A$800 million ($993 million) a year.

Independents Andrew Wilkie in the Lower House and Nick Xenophon in the Senate, supported by the Greens - who will hold the balance of power in the Upper House from next month - will introduce private member's bills to ban the trade.

Public outrage has been joined by Labor backbenchers and animal welfare groups, including the RSPCA and the World Society for the Protection of Animals.

A petition organised by the political website GetUp has now gained 236,000 signatures, to become what it claims is the fastest growing petition in Australia's history.

"Suspending trade to Indonesia is a good start, but there is no guarantee that Australian animals aren't being subjected to similarly horrific treatment in abattoirs in other countries right now," said GetUp campaign director Skye Laris.

The suspension announced by Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig yesterday follows a review begun straight after Four Corners went to air last week, and dramatically extends an initial ban on exports to 12 abattoirs identified in the ABC investigation.

"This suspension will be in place until the Government establishes sufficient safeguards to ensure there is verifiable and transparent supply chain assurance up to and including the point of slaughter for every consignment that leaves Australia," Ludwig said yesterday.

"A sustainable live cattle export industry must be built on the ability to safeguard the welfare of the animals.

"The trade to Indonesia will only recommence when we are certain industry is able to comply with that supply chain assurance."

Officials from both countries met in Jakarta on Tuesday and agreed on a series of meetings between livestock experts to establish "an immediate and a longer-term plan".

Even before Ludwig announced the decision, the impact of the clamour for action was being felt.

On Tuesday officials blocked more than 2000 cattle bound for Indonesia from boarding a live carrier at Port Hedland in the north of Western Australia, and yesterday trading in the shares of the nation's largest beef cattle producer, Australian Agricultural Company, was suspended to allow it to assess the impact of the Indonesian decision on its operations.

Australian Meat Industry Council spokesman Tom Maguire told the Age the nation's independent butchers, who account for about half of all meat sales in the nation, had reported a 10 to 15 per cent drop in sales.

"Seeing what was the appalling and abhorrent treatment of animals upsets people's values and makes them not want to eat meat."