Live cattle exports !

The horror engendered by the release of a video showing extreme cruelty to Australian cattle exported to Indonesia raises a wider problem in the live export of animals for domestic meat consumption.  Cattle and sheep exported from Australia create a one billion dollar world market - and this market employs ten thousand Australians in the chain of events leading to the loading of export ships.

The cruel practices in Indonesia are nothing new.  The whole process of cramming live animals on ships and transporting them to the other side of the world is distressing for the animals concerned, and many die before the ships arrive.   It is also a a highly uneconomic way to do business.

There have been constant calls for the practice to be banned - and now eleven Indonesian abattoirs will no longer be supplied.   No doubt Indonesia will discipline those abottoirs and in due course the ban will be lifted - and things will return to normal - whatever we or they consider " normal ".

Exporting live animals would be better served by processing the meat here in Australia - and exporting it in frozen form.  This would cut shipping costs sharply - and this is the practice followed when Australian meat is exported to other than Muslim countries.

Live exports are only involved when meat is required by Islam - and there are some very real obstacles to introducing reforms.    Islam insists that animals slaughtered for domestic consumption be killed by those of the Islamic religion and that they follow strict religious practice.   They must offer a prayer - and the killing method must be by slitting the animals throat while it faces towards Mecca.  It is not common practice to stun the beast to lower the level of distress.

Obviously, this should not be a problem if the receiving countries developed abattoirs in Australia employing Muslims who followed Islamic practice.   The meat would then be packaged, frozen and exported at much lower cost than when live trade is involved.

The problem is the standards of the receiving countries.  They mostly lack any form of domestic refrigeration and as a necessity the killing and processing of meat from the abattoir to the dining table must follow a very short time frame.    The standard of hygiene involved would make most Australians shudder !

There is little point in demanding a change to live exports until Muslim countries get their act together and create the conditions to safely handle the distribution of frozen food - all the way from the docks to the distribution centres - and onward to the shops that sell to the public.

There seems little will to make a change - and perhaps that will only come when the supply of meat decreases - and forces a sharp increase in price.

The world is heading for a food shortage and the day is fast coming when Australia may refuse to continue to make live exports - because world demand is such that frozen meat processed in Australia can pick and choose the markets that will be supplied.

In the interim,  those Indonesian abattoirs will be under pressure to at least improve their practices !