Live Exports Senselessly Cruel
From eNews 486 – Friday, 5 March 2010
I am hosting a forum next Wednesday at Parliament House to highlight the ongoing inhumane and economically damaging live animal export industry in Australia. I invite you to join me from 10am Wednesday 9 March at the Parliamentary Theatrette.
Australia is the largest exporter of animals for slaughter in the world, sending four million live sheep to the Middle East every year.
Sheep condemned to export suffer a long harrowing journey. They travel about 14 hours on crowded trucks to ports where they suffer heat stress and are unable to get up when they fall. They are then kept at holding facilities for five days to get used to the food pellets they will be fed at sea. The sheep are then crammed on ships at three sheep per square metre to travel for up to four weeks where they suffer heat stress, starvation, and diseases like scabby mouth, pink eye and salmonellosis. The number of sheep that die on the journey shockingly was over 40,000 in 2008.
For the sheep that do survive the trip, a terrible fate awaits in the hands of countries that have no, or do not enforce, animal welfare laws. They can be handled and slaughtered in ways that not only are illegal in Australia but would shock and appal most people, like slaughter without stunning.
Most animal cruelty is linked to profit but independent reports show that live exports harm the economy through loss of meat industry work, like packing and abattoir jobs. Australia already exports chilled meat to all countries that import live sheep and meat exports could easily replace live exports, adding value to the Australian economy through meat processing work while ensuring better treatment and humane slaughter.
In Parliament I asked the Minister for Primary Industries questions about supporting the meat processing industry over live exports. The knowledge that live exports are not only cruel but also cost the economy means everyone should support their end.
I encourage you to attend Wednesday's Humane Chain forum to highlight the ongoing inhumane and economically damaging live animal export industry, which will include recent documented evidence of cruelty along the live export supply chain.
Information
Forum: 9 March, 10am to 12pm, Parliamentary Theatrette; RSVP: jessicaborg@wspa.org.au
My questions www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/la/qala.nsf/18101dc...
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