At last week’s LIVEXchange 2025 conference in Perth three people with significant experience in Western Australia’s sheep export trade shared the story of the industry’s rise, growth, successes, battles with unions and controversies, and ultimately its fall at the hands of the Albanese Government in last year’s decision to phase the trade out by 2028.
In a Q&A hosted by former Meat & Livestock Australia general manager for trade and market access Dr Peter Barnard, the job of retracing the industry’s steps fell on the shoulders of three men whose careers have collectively spanned the past 50 years of Western Australian Livestock Exporters Association, including also serving as chairs of the association: Steve Meewald (WALEA Chair 1991–1998), John Edwards (WALEA Chair 2003–2013) and John Cunnington (WALEA Chair 2018-present).
The session took the time to mark achievements and contributions made by the trade over the past half-century, while also looking forward to apply insights from the past to inform and shape the livestock export trade’s future direction.
Here is what they said:
Q 1 – How the trade began
The trade in its early infancy dates back to the late 1800s/early 1900s and involved sheep penned on decks of cargo ships in makeshift wooden pens. The sheep trade in those days was primarily to Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong and involved only small numbers (hundreds) of sheep per voyage. The Singapore “shipper” trade became most prominent at the time and notable when the ‘passenger liner’ Centaur started carrying several thousand sheep.
Early pioneers of the trade recognised the potential of sheep exports to the Middle East in the late 1950’s, a region of large sheep meat eaters. A 1960’s building boom triggered by newfound oil wealth and large numbers of foreign skilled workers, predominantly Muslims imported to do the work, all needed feeding. Those pioneers saw in Australia a ready made supply of Merino sheep all able to be slaughtered in-market to cultural and religious beliefs. Refrigeration and cold stores were very limited so wet markets and same day consumption were the order of the day.
1960 saw the first shipment of 2500 sheep exported from Fremantle to Kuwait. From a modest 160,000 that year, export numbers to the Middle East over the next decade rose quickly and then into the millions each year onwards from 1973 as the trade scaled up significantly and eventually rose to an all-time high of 7.7m sheep exported in 1987.
The live trade quickly became essential for WA sheep producers and the importing countries, and it played to the natural advantages of both. Our healthy Merino sheep were highly sought after, our Middle East customers needed live sheep and lots of them and Australia was seen as a trusted reliable supplier.
Important to note the WA sheep industry long ago geared itself up quickly to servicing the trade and enabling the rapid growth in trade. There was significant investment by exporters and importers in WA feedlots, feedmills, transport logistics and vessel loading infrastructure, all to help provide an uninterrupted supply of sheep and growth in exports.
WA’s relative accessibility to the markets of the Middle East – shorter voyages, lower shipping costs and faster turnaround of vessels – all contributed to WA being the major supplier of sheep over the next six decades to those first early markets of Kuwait and the UAE, and then subsequently to Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Jordan -all regular buyers of our sheep to this day, but also to Egypt, Turkey, Lebanon, Algeria and Libya being significant importers over the journey.
Q2 – Formation of WA Livestock Exporters Association, role in supporting the early trade and early trade growth
The numbers of sheep being exported from Australia since 1960 grew very rapidly. Exports broke the one million head per annum 1973 and by 1977 had reached 3.4m nationally. WA was leading the way and exporters here needed representation particularly in the face of growing meat industry union opposition to the trade. WALEA was inaugurated in July 1977. Its founding chairman was Trevor Eastwood representing Wesfarmers who would go on to be its Managing Director and Chairman. WALEA’s membership at the time consisted of nine exporters.
WALEA’s role then and now was to ensure the export of livestock is conducted in the best interests of the industry, to support its viability and ensure high standards of animal welfare and best practice occurs. The association is also charged with discussions and negotiations with ALEC, government departments, peak councils and other stakeholders in the trade.
WALEA members were also the catalyst for the formation of the national representative body for live exporters – the Australian Livestock Exporters Association formed in the late 1970’s (ALEA became ALEC in 1985). WALEA Chairman Trevor Eastwood was the inaugural ALEA Chairman also.
WALEA had a seat at all of the initial steering committees for the trade’s development including the formative Live Exporters Consultative committee developed to advise the government and AMLC back in the day.
WA producers have long suffered from a lack of competition for their sheep, compared to their eastern States counterparts, simply due to the distance to market when looking for alternatives to the small number of processors in the state.
The reverse is true when we look at our overseas markets. WA is favourably positioned to supply the Middle East sheep markets and is also much closer to our Asian neighbours, favouring our cattle producers.
Advocacy since the formation of WALEA was a catalyst for the founding of the Australian Livestock Exporters Association. Leading policy initiatives ever since has been WALEA’s mandate from its members. Exporters, producers and the many supporting businesses, as well as the Australian economy, have been the beneficiaries of these efforts for almost 50 years.
Q3 – Attitude of farmers and others to the newly emerging trade
Farmers saw the emerging live sheep trade as a new and profitable outlet for their cast for age wethers at the end of their wool producing life. Previously they were at the mercy of the processing industry and what the mutton value was on the day.
The live export trade was buying sheep 12 months of the year and in growing numbers as new markets emerged and trade volumes increased. The Australian Meat Industry Workers Union was becoming increasingly militant towards the live sheep trade in the mid 1970’s as they argued live exports was exporting Australian jobs. This culminated in pickets at feedlots and wharves around WA and in the eastern states eventually leading to the federal government imposing quota ratios where for every live sheep exported a higher number of sheep carcases must be shipped.
Slaughter values for sheep around this time had collapsed to $2.00 per head whilst export prices for suitable wethers were worth $6 – $8 and farmers for the first time saw the imperative of the trade.
WALEA members in 1978 were instrumental in working with the grower groups to fight back and get vessels loaded by farmers at Esperance, Albany and Fremantle. Over the next five years the unions continued their waterfront battle against the live trade further threatening trade and interrupting the livelihoods of farmers, feedlotters and exporters. WALEA and the newly formed national body of live exporters ALEA, took up the case with the Government who eventually concluded live sheep exports cannot be replaced by the carcase trade and farmers returns would have fallen $155 million in 1981-82 if a quota of one carcase for 1 live sheep exported had applied.
The value of the trade is further highlighted when we consider the impacts of the wool reserve price scheme crash in 1991 leading to an overnight collapse of wool and sheep prices. Over the next decade the Australian sheep population would go into free fall. Sheep meat processors were overwhelmed with supply and farmers began destroying sheep under a government incentivised program. Live sheep exporters were however instrumental in uploading hundreds of thousands of sheep monthly from distressed parts of the country helping to alleviate an even greater financial disaster for producers.
Australia experienced what was to become known as the Millenium drought from 2001 to 2009, especially in southern and eastern Australia. Processors again were inundated with sheep and again the versatility of the live sheep trade came to the fore with sheep exporters able to position vessels to those states hardest hit and shift hundreds of thousands of sheep literally overnight from barren paddocks into export feedlots, onto vessels and away to markets.
Q4 Attitude of regulators
John Edwards
In 1981/82 half of the six million sheep exported from Australia in each of these years came from WA. The live export market was proving to be a very valuable outlet for WA and Australian growers.
It would be fair to say that during the formative years the sheep trade had the support of government because of the significant earnings it was generating for the economy and the flow-on effects across the Australian supply chain. Despite the Meat Workers Union best efforts in 70s and early 80s efforts to unseat the trade they failed, but took a new tact in the 90’s joining forces with the animal activists groups to up-the-anti against both sheep and cattle exports.
With politics and populist votes creeping into the trade, concern was there of course that the Government would flip and flop over the trade. Live cattle exports were now on the rise and the unions were on the attack again. Unrealistic demands by the unions over enterprise bargaining, industrial unrest and exorbitant processing costs all aided the live trade’s economic support from the government during these years but significant regulation and oversight of the trade wasn’t far away.
Exporters had long been working with WA Dept of Agriculture researchers (John Sutor, Richard Norris and Colin McDonald) investigating the inappetence/shy feeder syndrome in sheep during the preparation and sea voyage, as it was a significant contributor to mortality at sea. Early identification of shy feeders in consignments, changes to handling and pre-feeding practices and ration formulations which all helped reduce morbidity and mortality came from this trial work and cooperation.
The WA Department were also instrumental in their work with helping develop vaccination protocols around scabby mouth disease enabling exporters to ship with confidence back to Saudi Arabia in 2000 after the trade had been closed for 10 years. In combination with the “Scratch to Catch the Market Campaign” this initiative had flow on to protecting all the other sheep markets and was a significant windfall for WA sheep producers.
Whilst early overseas Government trade missions may have been representative in their efforts, it was WALEA exporter members in many instances through their own initiatives who were the ones that sought out and developed new sheep markets with their importer counterparts for Australian sheep. It was the exporters in cooperation with the importers and industry resources who helped set up their facilities including feedlots, handling systems, transport and slaughterhouses along with training. Every single sheep market from Kuwait (1960) through to Turkey (2010) was developed this way and it was WALEA in many instances working with exporter members and through ALEC to get the all-important health protocols sorted with government.
It should be noted also that it was also the live export trade responsible for the early development of the frozen sheep meat markets in the region as the first meat traders were the live importers themselves loading boxed meat in reefer space on their vessels carrying livestock.
Q5 – The future of the cattle trade
John Cunnington
Slated by many economists to be globally the fourth largest economy by 2050, we have a population that is young, growing and with a rapidly emerging middle class as one of our closest neighbours in Indonesia.
We have the history of supplying feeder cattle to that market for over 40 years, so there are deep ties and relationships. We have President Prabowo mandating a strategic shift in its beef supply policy, moving away from importing frozen meat and focusing instead on procuring and raising live cattle domestically. And all of this is only 3.5 days sailing from Broome Port, with a new port allowing 24/7, 365 loading.
In saying this, I believe we sometimes take Indonesia for granted that it will always be there. At the same time as President Prabowo is having a strategic shift towards live cattle, Indonesia is also making strategic moves to focus on relationships with BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries. At both a Government to Government and Business to Business level, we need to further invest in relationships. It is our most important market and is essential for a live export industry into the future.
From a WA perspective, Indonesia still remains our most important market, with Vietnam being our second largest market after the downturn in numbers to Israel.
Over the last three years, we have seen year on year increases to supply in Jordan. This is now at its highest levels since 2013 which is fantastic seeing a lot of the Middle East is being heavily supplied by South America.
When we break it all down though, there is a very simple equation that puts the Australian live cattle trade in a strong position for the future. We have a location advantage to South East Asia. A region with a strong emerging middle class that values the importance of red meat in their diet. Australia produces the right cattle to suit the region and are comparatively disease free. Putting all of this together, we are in the prime position to be a strong industry with growth potential. In saying all this, we can’t rest on our laurels and just expect it. Others are there willing and ready to replace us, especially as our regulatory restrictions make things more and more difficult.
Q6 – Changes to vessels
John Edwards
Significant to the development of both the sheep and cattle export trades and volumes shipped has been the level of investment in vessels by their owners (exporters, importers and owner-operator providing charters).
As markets grew and sheep export numbers increased, innovation, efficiency and economies of scale drove the size of vessels engaged in the trade. Profitability encouraged investment in ships and so in the 1970s early 80s as export numbers started to increase exponentially there was a rapid movement away from the small converted general purpose cargo ships that gave the industry its start to the super carriers, converted tankers with a superstructure of two tiered sheep pens on their decks and fodder and water carried in their tanks. These vessels had capacity of 50,000-120,000 sheep each and consequently the yearly carrying capacity of the trade was significantly increased with the regular turnaround of these vessels. With these vessels came improvements to design, feed and& water storage and delivery systems onboard.
In the early 2000s arrived the next generation of sheep carriers, some converted vessels others custom built from the keel up, built solely for the purpose of carrying sheep or cattle, all on single full height decks, the template for what the trade would become, multi species vessels that could carry sheep or cattle and trade to near neighbours or across vast oceans. Significant improvements to ventilation and air turnover were developed for these vessels as well as huge onboard water producing capacity through reverse osmosis systems.
The design and build evolution for sheep vessels saw continuous improvements in animal welfare outcomes and voyage success rates to arrive at the record-breaking levels constantly achieved these days.
John Cunnington
Like the sheep trade, the cattle trade started in the very early days with a few animals as deck cargo in makeshift pens.
Small capacity converted cargo vessels housing cattle below decks were the norm during the 1970s and 80’s as exports started to increase but struggled to exceed 100,000 per annum. The size of these vessels was often governed by berth size and draft at discharging ports.
It wasn’t till the early 1990s that cattle exports rose sharply and later this decade came the first of the large capacity purpose-built cattle ships like the Bison, Buffalo, Devon and Shorthorn Express vessels and the Al Nilam.
The mid 2000s bought continued evolution for the cattle carriers with new vessels joining the fleet with improved design and onboard systems delivering greater comfort for cattle cargoes. These were a mix of fully and partially enclosed vessels that had significantly larger carrying capacity G-Class 3700 head, Swagman/Outback/Dareen 6500 head.
When market conditions permitted, the very large single full height deck vessels usually engaged in carrying sheep and cattle to Middle East and North African markets were deployed to the northern cattle trade and were transporting 15,000–23,000 head cattle consignments to multiple ports in Indonesia.
Today we see short and long-haul cattle voyages delivering cattle with increased live weights and minimal mortality to markets around the world.
Q7 – The trade has been in the headlines several times over the past 50 years with criticism or issues that had to be confronted. How has the trade reacted to these crises and what has changed as a result?
Steve Meerwald
Unfortunately, that cuts both ways. Industry’s constant take-up of new systems and processes were accelerated after each “crisis” event.
The Farid Fares and other vessel-related incidents resulted in stricter and more diligent vessel approval and monitoring. As a consequence, Australian AMSA standards are the global benchmark for those countries that make any effort to regulate livestock vessels trading from their ports.
The maiden voyage of the Becrux in 2002 on which bos taurus cattle suffered heat stress and many were lost resulted in the development of ‘Hot Stuff’ heat stress assessment software that was a global first and is still used to assess and manage risk in shipments over summer periods.
When the Awassi Express footage was released, prompting another review, allometric stocking densities were implemented and the standards adjusted accordingly.
There can be no doubt that the application of these new management tools has had a major positive impact on animal welfare and commercial outcomes for the industry.
To the point that after 50 years of a continuous improvement and many millions of dollars of R&D, the trade can rightfully and unquestionably boast as leading the global animal production industry in welfare outcomes, bar none.
The flipside of a crisis, when it does occur, is that it provides the anti-trade lobby with material to target politicians and the public, who, in the main, are genuinely naive and easily influenced by what are usually very graphic and disturbing images. It’s pretty obvious that the 2011 cattle trade halt was a direct result of politicians bending to these influencers as is the case now with the ban on the sheep trade coming into effect in 2028.
The tragedy in this is that 50 years of experience, learnings and continuous improvement has been ignored to win a few votes in inner city seats in the East.
The reversal of the ban when a coalition government is eventually returned will be too late, the supporting infrastructure is already falling away, feedlots on the outskirts of Perth on land worth millions of dollars won’t remain, ships will not renew Australian certification and new ships aren’t being built.
Unlike government policy, planning and development of this necessary supporting infrastructure is years in the making.
Q8 – Animal record of the trade – how have animal welfare outcomes changed over time?
John Cunnington
The industry is recording it best results in its history for voyages. This is captured by the data showing that the daily mortality rate across the production and transport systems is lowest when sheep and cattle are in the live export supply chain.
Steve previously talked about the outcomes as a result of a crisis. I would just like to reiterate though that the trade has been making continual improvements over the past 50 years in the interim. It is a continual positive shift with the animal welfare outcomes always being the focus.
Like any business involving animals the journey has been one about incremental improvement every step of the way. We transport the most perishable of products – live animals – over long road distances and voyages across vast oceans to deliver animals in the best possible condition with the least number of mortalities. We are in “the livestock, not the dead stock, business” and these results ultimately make or break a business. Industry is today rightly proud of its performance and the animal welfare outcomes achieved over the trade’s journey.
Sheep voyage mortalities: in the 1990’s mortalities were around 2 percent (by 1994 reductions to the 2 percent level were first reached)
In 2003 mortalities broke through the 1 percent barrier.
By 2017 they had come down to 0.7 percent and by 2021 regular success rates of 0.2-0.3 percent werebeing achieved in the sheep trade.
Cattle consistently have remained at extremely high rates of successful deliveries for over 20 years, and industry continues to make this as high as possible.
What makes me really proud is when I see my team in market going and presenting about low stress stock handling, slaughter training and generally shifting attitudes towards animal welfare. The benefits we are seeing are not only ensuring that the Australian animals are well cared for whilst they’ve arrived, but we are making real, generational shifts in attitudes towards animal welfare which could have taken decades. We have found by using local staff, with local dialect, we are making real and measurable changes and something that industry as a whole should be extremely proud of.
When we look at welfare investment through the industry, not only do we have importers, exporters and the wider supply chain pouring millions into improvements year on year, we have the LEP R&D program always looking at advancements. For years, the holy grail around the world have been animal welfare indicators and we may be the industry to finally find the solution which will be extremely exciting.
Q9 Final points?
Steve Meerwald
What we have learnt is that no matter how good you become, how world class your outcomes are, it means nothing if you are on the wrong side of the debate in electorates that are critical to form government.
Why else would you destroy a world class trade that supplies critical and culturally important products to long standing trade partners who have taken on, at great cost, the imposition of ESCAS and invested millions to comply with our standards?
In the future Australia’s shame won’t be live exports, it will be how we turned our back on our customers and the export of our animal welfare standards to markets that were embracing this change.
John Edwards
For us as exporters and producers, we have been told for years that we must supply what the customers wants – and that’s what we have collectively been doing for over five decades to the benefit of the country through live sheep and cattle exports.
Opposition to the trade continues to loom large again with a new target in sight. Industry should pay heed to the fact that its professionalism and welfare performance can be lost in the noise of politics and activism so it must be ready and not go quietly in the next fight.
John Cunnington
As Steve touched on, we should never take for granted that the industry will have the support of Government and that the industry is safe. From this perspective, the Cattle Growth Plan being developed by LiveCorp and ALEC to cement the industry’s position as part of the cattle industry and ensure prosperity for the industry over the next decade.
It will take the whole of the supply chain buying in and supporting it to ensure its success. My parting message would be for anyone involved in the industry not to assume someone else has got it covered – be involved, be vocal and be proud of the industry we have all created.
www.beefcentral.com/live-export/a-journey-through-50-years-of-wa-sheep-and-cattle-export-history/
