Live Exports – Another 36 408 animals dead on ships yet the trade goes on
by Jenny Hume [0]
It is commonly assumed that the live export trade in sheep and cattle to the
For those interested my two earlier pieces on the live animal export trade give a background to the history and issues of the trade – Live animal exports in heavy seas [0] and Live animal exports – defending the indefensible. [0]
With another 36,408 animals dead on their ships last year, the powerful vested interests that run this trade will even go to Court to challenge new regulations designed to try and improve conditions for the sheep on board.
A coalition of importing and exporting companies have just taken the Federal Government to court [1] after AQIS (Australian Quarantine Inspection Service) ordered in May this year that 10-15% extra space be given to sheep on open two tier deck ships to lessen the impact of heat stress, crowding and so on. Heat stress has been a major cause of deaths in sheep and cattle on ships.
The companies claim that this regulation will lose them millions of dollars in that they will have to ship less sheep on each voyage as a result. Comfort of the sheep is clearly not their primary concern. So they want the ruling overturned in Court. The dispute is about to go to mediation. Will the Rudd Government bow to the pressure? Probably.
Kevin Rudd has already bowed to pressure to re-open the live cattle trade to Egypt after John Howard suspended it on grounds of the cruelty, following exposure by Animals Australia [2] in its footage in the Bassatin meatworks where hundreds of thousands of our cattle had been shipped and slaughtered for many years. The industry would have known about Bassatin, but it was not the industry that told us what was going on there. Nor did the government. We had to rely on concerned members of the public both here and in
Then in 2007 the WA Labor Government intervened to effectively prevent a live export company from being convicted of cruelty after the court case [3] against it was proven. This was the case that Animals Australia initiated over the deaths of 1,000 sheep on one of that company’s ships, the Al Kuwait.
It is a fact, and an accepted fact by industry and the government, that for every 100,000 sheep loaded on a ship an average of 1,000 will likely be dead on board before they arrive, losses that apparently the companies are prepared to wear. For them it seems it is better to carry the loss of a thousand dead sheep, but not the loss of shipping less sheep in order to give the animals more comfort and try and ensure fewer of them die.
In the period 2000-2007 almost 400,000 animals, mostly sheep and cattle, died on the voyage to various countries, the majority destined for the Middle East (ME). Hundreds of thousands more died in years prior to the year 2000. They died for several main reasons: heat stress and exhaustion, inanition (a euphemism for failure to eat during the two week journey), injury on slippery decks, disease outbreak, and/or disaster at sea. Around 200,000 were burnt to death on ships abandoned at sea when they caught fire.
Storms at sea create untold horror for the animals as the stockman's report on the Kalymnian Express graphically described when a third of its cargo of 900 cattle died or had to be put down due to injury. It was clearly a scene from hell. [Ed: Interested readers should go to the Australian Maritime Safety Authority's [4]website and search for Kalymnian Express, as the link to the relevant attachment is very long and does dreadful things to the line length of this article.]
Opposing the industry are the animal welfare organizations. In the forefront of the fight is Animals Australia (AA), a federation of some forty animal societies formed some thirty years ago through the efforts of Animal Liberation founder Christine Townend and philosopher Professor Peter Singer. Concerned not only about the suffering on the voyages, AA carried out five investigations in seven ME countries over five years to highlight the terrible plight of the animals after they arrive in the ME where there are no animal protection laws. The footages, if you can stomach them, can be found on its website. [5]
So why has the trade not been phased out as recommended over 25 years ago following a government inquiry into the industry chaired by the late Labor Senator George Georges?
Why do successive governments allow this trade to continue unabated?
Industry arguments in favour of the live trade
The Australian Government and the live export companies argue that the trade is of vital economic importance to this country; that the importing countries require animals to be killed in accordance with Islamic law; that lack of refrigeration and a desire for fresh killed meat drives demand for live animals in the importing countries; and that if Australia did not provide the live animals other countries would – this latter an old argument in favour of just about anything obnoxious, including the slave trade.
These arguments have become increasingly weak. The chilled meat trade far outstrips the live trade to the ME in value, and is growing every year.
When
But the Saudis are happy anyway to take chilled meat. There was a 67% increase in mutton exports to
MLA has also just reported an increase in the last fiscal year of 18% in the meat trade to the ME. Development in the ME countries has seen supermarket style outlets set up along similar lines in the West handling this rapidly growing chilled meat trade.
So any argument that the ME countries only want and can only handle live animals is simply not true.
The Halal Issue
This is a total furphy. There are 40 Halal accredited meat works in
What is halal slaughter? Are animals halal-slaughtered in the
Key requirements of halal killing, according to the Koran and Islamic leaders, include:
- not killing animals in the presence of other animals
- the animals are not to be bound
- the slaughterman makes a dedication of the animal to Allah
- the animal being slaughtered must face
- the animal should be killed with a single cut to the throat with a long sharp blade, and
- the animal must not suffer prior to slaughter.
Investigations by AA in the Middle East found that the halal requirements (as listed above) are routinely ignored in each of
Volume of halal accredited sheep meat to the ME
Together this level of sheep meat export is equivalent to 3.4 million live sheep (based on a “live sheep equivalent” of 21kg/carcase) so 3.4 million sheep were spared the trauma of those ships and the cruel handing and slaughter practices on arrival.
So what is the live trade worth in comparison to the meat trade?
The ABS figures for 2004-5 alone tell their own story.
The combined export value of meat exports (lamb, mutton and beef) was $ 6 billion.
The combined value of live sheep and cattle exports was a tenth of that: $ 0.674 billion.
Cattle
Live export of cattle: $464 million (FOB value*) (623,579 live cattle)
Beef exports: $4.9 billion (947,866 tonnes)
Sheep
Live export of Sheep: $210 million (FOB* value) (3,236,415 live sheep)
Lamb meat exports $701 million (123,060 tonnes)
Mutton meat exports $418 million (136,718 tonnes)
Total value of chilled meat exports: $1.119 billion
*Free On Board – the value of the animals before loading in
The Economics of the Live Trade Vs Meat Trade – Exports to
The value of chilled/frozen sheep meat to
The value of live sheep exported to
The value of chilled/frozen beef to
The value of live cattle FOB in 2005 (none in 2006 due to suspension of trade) was $3.5-7 million (variable reports).
This demonstrates that there is no barrier to
So why has the Rudd Government decided to recommence the shipment of live cattle into
The Saudis are quite happy to take the meat when
To these questions the Rudd government, like those before it, simply has no valid response.
How does the live export trade compare economically with killing the same animals in
The S G Heilbron Pty Ltd Report (commissioned by the Australian Meat Processor Corporation Limited, April 2000) entitled Impact of the Live Animal Export Sector on the Australian Meat Processing Industry included the following key points:
- The live export trade could be costing
- The primary factor driving the profitability of the live export trade is market distortions in favor of live animals. If it were not for these factors, the rising demand for meat in importing countries would have been met by exports of chilled and frozen meat.
- The Australian Meat Industry Employee Union (AMIEU) opposes the live export trade, and estimates the live export industry has cost 12,000 meat worker’s jobs and continues to undermine the sustainability of the abattoir industry.
Where to now?
This vile trade has no justification whatsoever, other than to fill the coffers of the few who financially benefit from it, many of them some of
As with the successful international campaigns against mulesing where boycotts of Australian wool overseas soon brought results, this trade may have to be similarly challenged.
Some posters on Webdiary seem to be of the view that those who concern themselves with this obnoxious trade care more about animal suffering than that of their fellow human beings, implying that they should divert their energies and their resources to what they see as more worthy causes. With that I could never agree.
As Ghandi once said, "The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated." One only has to visit some of those countries with a poor human rights record and then look at how they treat their animals to know the truth of that. But are we any better when for profit we ship millions of animals to those countries in the way we do while being fully aware of cruelty to animals in those countries? I say no, we are not.
Anyone interested in helping in the fight against it can go to: Animals Australia [9] or to the new coalition website of Handle With Care [10].
Warning: You may find the images and the videos on the sites very disturbing.