The Australian government has begun the process of phasing out live sheep export in a move welcomed by animal welfare organisations.
But the National Farmers’ Federation is opposing ending live export and will not participate in consultation about the best way to phase out the trade.
Consultation had started on the timeframe for phasing out live sheep export by sea, with an independent panel to make recommendations by September, the agriculture minister, Murray Watt, said on Friday.
“We want to do it in an inclusive way through good consultation with people. We’re not going to rush it,” he said.
Watt said no decision has been made on compensation for farmers.
“I’m not sure that we necessarily are facing a situation where farmers will lose their business or go out of business,” he said.
“Any issues around compensation, structural adjustment and those kinds of things are exactly the kind of things that we’re going to be asking the panel to give us advice on.”
Labor took the policy of ending live sheep export to two federal elections, spurred on by the Awassi Express disaster in 2018. The trade has declined dramatically since then, in part due to a ban on summer trading. Just 575,000 sheep were exported live from Australia in 2021, compared with 2 million in 2017.
All live sheep exports from Australia are run through two foreign-owned companies that operate out of Western Australia.
The RSPCA Australia chief executive, Richard Mussell, said establishing an independent panel to phase out the trade was an “appropriate and sensible move”, but urged the government to legislate an end date within its current term.
“Putting legislation in place before 2025 is the only way to give Australian farmers certainty, to protect Australia’s reputation internationally and to ensure that this cruel trade actually ends,” he said.
Mussell said the live sheep export trade had “deep, inherent and unfixable animal welfare issues”.
The Humane Society International and the Australian Alliance for Animals also welcomed the announcement, saying both the weight of animal welfare evidence and public opinion were against the trade.
“Live sheep export has been a source of profound suffering to Australian livestock over the years and has reaped untold damage on the nation’s clean, green agricultural reputation,” the Alliance for Animals policy director, Dr Jed Goodfellow, said.
Watt said the phase-out was unlikely to happen within this term of government.
The National Farmers’ Federation said it stands with 24 other peak agricultural bodies in Australia in opposing the ban on live sheep export and called on the government to reconsider.
“Cancelling an entire industry based on activist demands sets a dangerous precedent,” the NFF chief executive, Tony Mahar, said. “What industry will be next?”
Mahar said plans to phase out the trade ignore the “significant animal welfare improvements” made in recent years and would leave a gap in the market for other countries, with less strenuous animal welfare policies, to fill.
“We stand by our principles that wiping out an entire industry is not the answer and will not engage with the newly announced panel whose ultimate goal is to shut down live sheep export,” Mahar said.
The animal welfare policies implemented since the Awassi incident include a ban on sending sheep on ships during the Middle Eastern summer, reduced stocking densities and a policy requiring an independent observer to travel on board and file a report.
Data presented to Senate estimates last month showed that just 11 of the 78 eligible live export voyages that left Australia between May and December last year had an independent observer on board. Almost half of those that travelled without an observer said they didn’t have enough space on board.
The WA Farmers president, John Hassell, sent a letter to Watt after the announcement on Friday asking him to reconsider.
In the letter, seen by Australian Associated Press, Hassell said a ban would negatively affect 3,000 people associated with the industry, which he said is worth about $85m a year.
“We think that the government’s live export policy was a dumb commitment,” he wrote. “If there was ever a case study of improvement in an industry, then the live exports is it.”
Hassell is himself a sheep farmer and told AAP he was about to export 1,000 sheep to the Middle East.
The independent panel will be led by former Murray Darling Basin Authority chief and senior public servant Phillip Glyde and includes former RSPCA Australia boss Heather Neil, former Northern Territory Labor MP Warren Snowdon and WA farmer and entrepreneur Sue Middleton. It is due to report by 30 September.
