A recent study from Curtin University and a follow-up article in The Guardian claim that thousands of animals are being euthanised or dying after being transported to Australian export abattoirs, based on welfare reports from 2020/21.
They are correct, thousands are being euthanised. This sounds alarming, but let’s take a breather before we ban the industry.
The situation is far less dramatic when viewed in context. It shows that Australia’s livestock industry is doing an outstanding job in terms of animal welfare. The data has to be understood in the broader context of the Australian livestock industry. At EP3, we analyse agricultural markets every day (and often nights), and it’s always important to delve a little further.
In 2020/21, just over 1100 cattle, 2200 sheep, and 880 pigs were affected by welfare issues during transport. This may seem significant for the uninitiated, but these animals were part of a supply chain transporting over 38 million animals that year. In 2020/21, more than 6.2 million cattle, 26 million sheep, and 5.5 million pigs were processed at abattoirs within Australia.
That means the rate of affected animals was:
- 0.0186% for cattle
- 0.0086% for sheep
- 0.0161% for pigs
In basic terms, this translates to fewer than 2 out of every 10,000 animals transported to abattoirs. This is a relatively insignificant number of animals, and I would bet that it was among the lowest incident rates in the world.
These extremely low figures suggest that transport is managed effectively and humanely for the overwhelming majority of livestock.
The percentage of all animals which are affected, euthanised and dead on arrival for 2020/21
Where incidents do occur, the data shows that animals are euthanised quickly. While this might sound confronting, it reflects the fact that welfare protocols are being followed.
Australia is introducing voluntary assisted dying laws across its states, allowing those with terminal illnesses to choose a dignified and compassionate end to their lives. This reflects a broader societal principle: when suffering is unavoidable, we prioritise minimising pain and ensuring a humane end. The same thinking applies to animal welfare when livestock are injured or unfit to recover, prompt euthanasia is a deliberate and ethical decision made to prevent further suffering.
When animals are injured or in distress, abattoirs and inspectors act swiftly to prevent further suffering. This is part of a system designed to prioritise animal wellbeing at all supply chain stages.
Australia has some of the world’s most rigorous standards for animal transport, and export abattoirs operate under strict oversight, including veterinary inspections and independent audits. The industry takes animal welfare seriously, not just because it’s a legal requirement, but because producers, transporters, and processors all understand that good animal care is central to the integrity, sustainability and ultimately profitability of Australian agriculture.
The number of animals requiring euthanasia post transport, and the total number slaugthered for 2020/21
That said, the issues raised in the study, such as inspection delays and concerns about oversight resources, are worth addressing. The agricultural industry constantly evolves, learns, and applies its experience to reduce adverse animal welfare issues.
What’s important is that these discussions happen with the whole picture in view, not selective data and reporting. Analysis of welfare matters plays a vital role in holding systems to account. Still, it’s also essential to include context, such as the vast scale of livestock movements, the low rate of incidents, and the sector’s commitment to continual improvement.
Australia’s livestock industry should take the feedback seriously and be confident that it is operating to a high standard.
When the full context of these animals is taken into account, we should be proud that the number of animals suffering is extremely low, and that they are treated quickly.
The data shows that the overwhelming majority of animals are transported safely and humanely. That’s something worth recognising as the industry works to strengthen animal welfare even further.
With context, what appears in a report as seemingly antagonistic towards the livestock industry becomes quite positive.
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I appreciate everyone’s concern about welfare incidents in transported animals. The proportion of the total number transported may be small, but to the animals affected I suspect this is irrelevant. The debate about our paper would be improved if people had read the paper, which is freely available at https://bvajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/vro2.70009
Do feel free to take a look.
Note also that the data did not come from any report (Watt report), but directly from submissions to government.
I, would suggest if comparing animals going to processing venues compared to human travel, via road, rail and air would have far better figures than the latter.
I am probably one of the few members of the public who has read the 8,000 page report, put out by Senator Murray Watt, this would be the report where the summary of incident reports/animals requiring euthanasia came from. While the number of animals requiring euthanasia may have been a small percentage of the overall numbers, to me it shows a systemic problem and, surprisingly, it wasn’t so much with the abattoirs but more so with the farmers and to a lesser degree with transport drivers. Your numbers also appear not to include animal welfare issues that are not acceptable but did not end up requiring the animals to be euthanised. For example, there should have been no incidents that were a result of driver brutality but there were, including but not limited to, the excessive use of electric prodder, even on the face, walking on animals, kicking and striking animals. These animals did not necessarily require euthanasia but the treatment of them was reprehensible.
Of course there are going to be unavoidable accidents, for example an animal slipping on a ramp and being injured, but the number of animals euthanised because of issues that farmers should have addressed, issues that were blatantly obvious, is appalling. Those animals never should have been loaded, but treated or euthanised on the farm instead.
Some examples were horns growing into skulls/eyeballs on both cattle and sheep, bulls with prolapsed pizzles, animals blind in both eyes, animals with clearly obvious cancerous growths and hernias, cattle with pink eye and prolapsed eyes, pigs that were labelled on the pig passes as “suspect” so the farmers knew there was a problem, but rather than euthanise on farm still sent the animals to the abattoir.
That is just a very brief summary of the many, many incidents of required euthanasia that could have and should have been avoided if the farmers had taken the appropriate action on farm instead of loading unfit, sick and injured animals. Some farmers were repeat offenders but were still continued to load and send unfit animals, it appears with no consequence.
There are two abattoirs licenced to slaughter horses , only one was doing so during the period the report covered. I know, without doubt, that not all the horse related incidents, were included in Senator Watt’s report so it is more than probable (in my opinion) that the same applies for cattle, sheep and pigs.
If the industry wants to prove that they take animal welfare seriously, they need to clean up their act. When it comes to the avoidable suffering of animals. farmers need to be held accountable when they send unfit and/or suffering stock to the abattoir and transport drivers need to be held accountable when they cause unnecessary suffering to the animals. Only when this happens will unnecessary euthanasia at abattoirs lessen. The system now is failing and I applaud Curtain University and The Guardian for publishing their findings.
What I find most alarming is that those studies and figures are only for export abattoirs where there are reporting requirements and an OPV (on plant veterinarian), I hate to think what happens at domestic abattoirs where there are no reporting requirements and no OPV.
As per your comments policy, all the above can be confirmed by reading Senator Watt’s report which is publicly available.
just a footnote to my earlier comment, when I said a report by Senator Watt, that wasn’t strictly correct, the reports came straight from the industry and were collated by the government/Senator Watt’s department.
Why do we have to leave it to people like this to defend our industry?
It’s great work and welcome but where are our peak bodies and state farming organisations.
We need more of these honest and data driven rebuttals.
It also should be pointed out that those same numbers held on farms would have similar or higher percentage losses due to normal everyday reasons.
No different to the human per capita loses in everyday life.
About 1 in 150,000 passengers die on cruise ships each year. This is 0.0007%, equivalent to the “dead on arrival” rates for sheep and cattle being transported. People are not euthenased aboard ship for such injuries or diseases which might cause animals to be put down, so the livestock euthenasia rate can’t simply be compared to humans.
“Dead on arrival” is the appropriate comparison, and transporting people and livestock might, at least on a superficial comparison, present similar risk.
“Mortality per day in transit” might be a better metric but the data just aren’t available for either humans or animals.