Government halts all cattle exports to Indonesia
In a major win to ABC's Four Corners, the Gillard government has agreed to suspend all live cattle exports to Indonesia.
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In a major win to animal activists, and ABC’s Four Corners, the Gillard government has agreed to suspend all live cattle exports to Indonesia.
Prime Minister Gillard, speaking on the issue for the first time, said people had been rightly shocked at the video footage of cruelty to animals.
”In light of the evidence presented to us, we have resolved to put a total suspension in place,” Ms Gillard said. ”This suspension will remain until we can make sure cattle from Australia are treated properly at every step of the supply chain.
”We will be working closely with Indonesia, and with the industry, to make sure we can bring about major change to the way cattle are handled in these slaughter houses.”
The move could cost the industry up to $320 million.
Federal Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig’s initial response, which took two days to implement, was to ban the export of cattle to 12 known rogue abattoirs. But Cabinet agreed to the complete ban on Monday.
The action is a significant achievement by Four Corners ahead of its 50th anniversary on air in August. Five years ago similar footage of live cattle exports to Egypt forced the Australian Government to suspend trade.
Source:  The AgeÂ
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14 Responses
@Paul of Perth – are you able to list the Indonesian abattoirs that are compliant?
Lyn White and her team were only able to visit the eleven shown in the program. These were apparently chosen at random as being accessible rather than actually being known to be cruel to the animals. And some of these were ones that had the LiveCorp approved boxes that were supposed to make it easier on the animal. It’s a reasonable assumption that these barbaric practices are the norm throughout Indonesia and it is therefore sensible to suspend trade to all abattoirs until they have passed inspection.
I don’t think anyone (apart from rabid PETA types) wants to see Australian meat industry employees penalised but continuing to trade in misery is not on. I hope that the govt compensates those who do suffer but I also wonder how many within the industry knew or suspected what was going on but turned a blind eye towards it anyway.
Well done 4 Corners & the Labour party for your knee jerk reaction. Now who’s going to compensate the thousands of meat workers you have effectively put out of work. Would it not have been smarter to continue the trade to the abbatoirs that complied with Australian standards, but no not these clowns, they have to penalise everyone instead of just the offenders. Another great outcome for those that aren’t going to lose anything.
Fantastic effort Four Corners. The power of quality journalism that can influence change is still alive.
What about the cattle in Indonesia? Guess its just bad luck for them?
good but it could be a lot better they should ban All exports of live cattle to All countries i have a bad feling that Julia is just doing this untill the heat dies down and then it will be resume as normal
So glad to hear Gillard is taking this step. I still can’t get over what I saw in that program, and sincerely hope our cattle are never treated like that again!
Not good enough! All live exports should be stopped for good!
Stopping it for Indonesia for only six months is pathetic!
Its great that 4 Corners can show their first decent program for the year, and its June! Two thirds of their shows are from overseas, and poor quality at that. Did anyone see the program on concussion from NFL? Rubbish.
Between this, and the NRL abuse of women show is a show that is on a decline. On the history of the past keeps it going, and the one cracker per a year. We had ours for this one, bring on 2012.
I’m never a fan of knee-jerk reactions but Ludwig’s indecisive action was inadequate. Good to see Gillard’s stepped in. I’d really prefer that the animals were slaughtered in Australia where it’s easier to monitor what goes on and jobs stay in Australia.
Well done 4 Corners
This is a win for animal activists, Four Corners, the cattle, and the people of Australia whose voices have been heard loud and clear.
Well it shows the power of media, just like the implementation of GPS trackers for sex offenders in QLD which was basically fuelled from a Facebook page. In both cases I think the government has just made a reactionary move to win the public – not good government.
But they are still going to send boat people to Malaysia?
That’s great news,full marks to Four Corners for highlighting this barbaric treatment to cattle & The Federal Government for placing a total ban on cattle exports until proper methods are installed.