Australia’s new regulatory framework in Indonesia will ensure that any animal welfare breaches found to have occurred in the market can be dealt with appropriately without the need for another blanket shutdown of the trade, according to Cattle Council of Australia president Andrew Ogilvie.

The Australian Government has established a regulatory framework, the Export Supply Chain Assurance System, to ensure that problems in live export markets can be adequately managed on a supply chain to supply chain basis.

“This system defines the supply chains and differentiates between supply chains, and if one supply chain has a non-compliance, that doesn’t mean that the other supply chains aren’t doing the right thing,” Mr Ogilvie said.

“And the non-compliance of the particular supply chain will be dealt with by the regulator, and anything that is found that needs to be fixed will be fixed.”

With Animals Australia and the RSPCA again applying pressure to the Government to shut the trade down as a result of last night’s footage, Mr Ogilvie said he remains confident that Mr Ludwig and the Federal Government are committed to the industry’s future.

“At all meetings I have been to with minister Ludwig, he has stated very clearly that the Government is 100pc behind the live export industry, and will work using the ESCAS system to ensure the long term viability of the industry.”

Mr Ogilvie said the industry did not condone the sort of practices shown on ABC Lateline last night.

“I would say it was poor animal handling practices, but I wouldn’t equate it to abuse, there has been a lot of pretty loose language used, and abuse is deliberate mistreatment of animals.

“And that certainly wasn’t the case there, it was poor animal handling practices, and industry doesn’t support poor animal handling practices.”

The Australian industry was hugely proud of the gains that had been made in animal welfare over several years.

He said it was important that the current DAFF investigation into the footage contained in last night’s program was allowed to run its course.

“It is appropriate that the DAFF investigation proceed and be concluded, and that then there be some corrective actions taken out of that investigation, so we need to let that proceed without prejudicing that in any way.”