Activist group GetUp! has launched a new campaign against live animal exports designed to coincide with the final sitting of Parliament for 2012.
The group began airing a commercial on pay-television news channel Sky News last week which contains graphic video footage taken of the recent inhumane cull of Australian sheep in Pakistan.
It has also developed a second commercial for release on free-to-air, prime time television this week which shows the faces of people as they react to images shown in the first commercial.
GetUp! said it was unable to get approval to show the footage from the first advertisement on commercial television during prime-time hours due to its disturbing content, so developed the second commercial to draw attention to the issue.
“We've found a way to reach as many people as possible in order to dial up the pressure on our politicians to do the right thing,” the group said in an email to supporters yesterday.
GetUp! said it received donations from more than 1000 members to fund the first advertisement on Sky News and is now seeking donations from its members to fund the second advertisement.
“Our best opportunity to make this happen is now — on the back of recent media coverage, while both houses of Parliament are still sitting, people are protesting and MPs are feeling the heat.”
Legislation introduced by Senator Lee Rhiannon which seeks to end live exports is still before the Senate, while independent member of parliament Andrew Wilkie recently re-introduced an amended version of a previous bill which calls for animal exports to continue only to markets that guarantee pre-slaughter stunning.
NZ v Aus
The advertisement highlights New Zealand’s decision to ban livestock exports for slaughter, and calls for Australia to “do the right thing and end the senseless slaughter”. It states that Australia can process all exported livestock locally to maintain animal welfare standards and to protect jobs while still taking care of farmers.
In response Australian livestock export industry leaders say it is incorrect to compare the “partial prohibition” of livestock exports for slaughter in New Zealand with the Australian situation, because the economic factors and forces at play are entirely different, as are the industries themselves.
New Zealand prohibited the export of sheep for slaughter in 2003 and cattle in 2007, unless approval is granted by the Director-General of Agriculture and Forestry on a case-by-case basis.
New Zealand exported around 500,000 live sheep per year in the mid-1980s to early 1990s, mainly to Saudi Arabia. However, due to a range of factors including the costs, restrictions placed on the type of sheep able to be exported (predominantly less hardy European crosses) and competition with Australian exporters, the trade diminished in the late 1990s.
When the partial prohibition was introduced in 2003, the industry was essentially non-operational, and the ban had little economic impact on the country’s sheep industry.
At that time New Zealand sheep meat producers were also in the middle of a significant structural adjustment process in response to a range of factors, primarily poor wool prices and a transition to dairying, when the prohibition was applied.
By comparison Australia exports around 2-2.5 million sheep each year, predominantly from Western Australia, where sheep meat producers have less adjustment flexibility because sheep and wool production is often the most profitable and feasible use of the land.
Live export industry leaders also take issue with the claim that Australian livestock producers would be better off without the live export trade.
They argue that Australia’s variability in production systems – tropical, rangeland, pastoral, pasture – and livestock and its relatively large and wealthy population has driven the development of three vibrant and successful industry sectors which compete for producers’ livestock.
These are the processing sector (domestic and export), the restocking sector and the livestock export sector.
By having a range of sectors, they maintain that Australia’s livestock producers are partially protected if one sector is damaged, have greater competition for their products and are able to put more land in Australia to productive use.
An industry spokesperson said New Zealand’s processing sector was able to out-compete the live export industry for livestock without government intervention.
“In Australia, the processing sector has been unable to compete with the live export trade in some areas, despite there being no barriers to establishment. It is likely that in these areas processing plants would only be successful if producers accepted lower prices for their livestock or the government implemented support measures to distort free and fair competition.”
Labor to establish ‘office of animal welfare’
A number of Labor backbench MPs have recently reiterated their calls for the Gillard Government to discontinue its support for live exports in the wake of the Pakistan sheep disaster.
The Australian newspaper this morning reported today that Labor Caucus instructed a Labor working group on live exports to develop a national office of animal welfare to provide additional oversight of the industry.
The motion would see the proposed office develop and review domestic animal welfare standards, look at the enforcement of live export regulation and examine domestic laws, according to The Australian.
The preferred model will be presented to caucus by the end of February.
Labor MPs Kelvin Thomson and Melissa Parke who sponsored the motion issued a statement welcomed its carriage by Caucus.
“The proposal will consider the location of the office within government, and the legal status of the office.
“We are pleased that the Parliamentary Labor Party has responded to the recent revelations about the disgraceful treatment of Australian sheep exported to Bahrain and Pakistan.
“We hope that the Live Animal Export Working Party will come up with a model which helps secure decent and humane animal welfare outcomes.
“We believe this is what Australians want.”
The Australian said live export industry leaders have also written to all Federal MPs and Senators this week – for the second time in two months – saying that according to their research 69pc of Australians supported the continuation of livestock exports.