Porky Pies from Elders boss
Australia's largest exporter of breeder livestock says its shipments of cattle into Indonesia have not been delayed.
Elders CEO Malcolm Jackman
Elders chief executive Malcolm Jackman says 4,500 breeder beef cattle have successfully been delivered, despite reports of other animals being stranded due to Indonesia tightening up requirements for livestock pedigrees.
Mr Jackman says his company can meet Indonesia's requirements for cattle pedigrees.
"Yes, there was a requirement for providing breeding documentation. For cattle bred in the Top End that's a significantly more difficult issue," he said.
"What we've been able to do, is say, 'this particular block had this number of bulls in there, and therefore the father is one of these', and listed those [bulls]. And that has met the documentation requirement. That's my understanding."
Mr Jackman says Australia must be careful, in investigating whether more needs to be done to ensure the welfare of breeder cattle once they've been sent overseas, not to make policy according to "the lowest common denominator."
"We would get to the point then that if there's a car accident in your suburb, cars would be banned in your suburb.
"We need to be careful that we don't provide an hysterical response and dumb down to the lowest common denominator."
Mr Jackman says Australia has upset and offended live export trading partners such as Japan, by imposing the ESCAS welfare system despite there being no reports of mistreatment in that country.
Elders exports 13,000 head of wagyu/angus cross cattle to Japan each year, lucrative beasts which make a lot of money when they're eventually slaughtered.
He says the Japanese are angry they're now required to comply with ESCAS, the welfare assurance system introduced by the Australian Government when the live cattle trade to Indonesia reopened last year after a month-long ban.
"The imposition of the ESCAS rules in Japan is causing a huge disruption to trade, and Japanese importers and Japanese farmers in that trade, which is a long-established trade where there's never been any issues, are saying 'you've had a problem in Indonesia and you are now going to cane the rest of the world by going down this path.
"So we need to make sure that the response reflects reality."
Source: farmonline.com.au