Live export – the cruel truth

Myth: By supplying animals to the Middle East, Australia has more leverage for improving standards in importing countries

FACT: None of the countries to which Australia sends animals for slaughter have equivalent animal welfare protection laws.  While improvements have been made in some instances, video footage collected by investigators in 2008 shows extremely inhumane transport conditions, handling and slaughter techniques.  Treatment that would be neither tolerated nor legal in Australia.

Myth: If Australia doesn’t supply animals, other countries with worse animal welfare standards will

FACT: The presence of Australian animals in the importing countries conveys the dreadful message that Australians approve of their animal welfare practices.
Australia’s distance from importing countries means that our animals are forced to travel very long distances to their place of slaughter, they are often unsuitable for handling and transport because they have such limited contact with humans and, because Australian animals raised in cool climates and are not used to high temperatures they can experience great difficulty adjusting to the climate differences.
 
The Handle with Care coalition is calling for the Australian Government to work with industry and importing countries to expand the current trade in chilled and frozen meat from animals that have been humanely transported and slaughtered in Australia.

Myth: By supplying animals to the Middle East, Australia has more leverage for improving standards in importing countries

FACT: None of the countries to which Australia sends animals for slaughter have equivalent animal welfare protection laws.  While improvements have been made in some instances, video footage collected by investigators in 2007 shows extremely inhumane transport conditions, handling and slaughter techniques.  Treatment that would be neither tolerated nor legal in Australia.

Animals are often transported in inappropriate vehicles, and lack of ramps and unloading races results in physical force being used to move animals, including throwing and dropping animals and lifting and dragging them by body parts. Inhumane slaughtering methods in some importing countries includes cutting leg tendons and stabbing the eyes of cattle to bring them down, often followed by ineffective throat-cutting. Sheep are also killed without pre-stunning, have their throats cut and bleed to death.  Animals purchased for ‘home slaughter’ can face even crueler slaughtering methods.

Myth: Importing countries demand live animals for religious purposes or due to lack of refrigeration

FACT: Middle East countries that currently import live animals also import chilled meat, and the demand for chilled meat is growing every year.
Australia currently has a significant and growing export trade in halal accredited chilled and frozen meat, and last year the export of sheepmeat was more than four times as valuable as the export of live sheep and the export of beef more than ten times more valuable than the export of cattle.

During the previous ban on live sheep and cattle from Australia to Saudi Arabia (1991 - 2000), there was a three-fold increase in exports of chilled and frozen mutton and lamb to that market - evidence that consumers in the Middle East will accept meat from animals humanely killed in Australia.

Myth: Ending live exports will cost Australian jobs

FACT: Australia‘s meat trade is worth double the live export trade. An increase in meat exports would contribute to the economy by creating more business for Australia‘s abattoirs and processors.