Summary

The Australian government, livestock industry (including producers and veterinarians), media, animal welfare groups and the general public have shown a keen interest in the care and welfare of sheep, cattle and goats being exported from Australia.

Each year, the Australian livestock export industry provides a breakdown of how many sheep, cattle and goats were exported, the month that shipments left Australia, and the sea ports or airports where livestock were loaded and unloaded. This includes details of how many animals were safely delivered and how many died along the way, but does not specify the cause of death.

This project summarised the performance of the Australian livestock export industry in 2013. For the first time, the report references investigations into high mortality voyages and flights by the regulator. Details of the findings have been available to the public for a number of years on the department's website. This report includes these voyages and flights in summary figures, but has excluded them in analysis of some long-term trends.

The performance reports provide consistent, comparable data that can be matched against previous years. This acts as a gauge of how the Australian livestock export industry is performing and encourages continued improvement.

Objective

This project provided data regarding sheep, cattle and goats exported live from Australia during 2013 by sea and air, including time of year, age and sex of the animals, and the number that died during export.

The collection of this information has enabled the long-term mapping of the Australian livestock export industry’s overall performance year on year.

Key findings

In 2013:

• There were 1.94 million sheep exported by sea. Of these, 0.68% died during the voyages, a record low and significantly lower than 2012 (0.81%) .

• There were 35,875 sheep exported by air. Of these, 0.13% died during the flights, compared to nil in 2012.

• There were 0.84 million cattle exported by sea. Of these, 0.11% died during the voyages, equal to the rate in 2012. During 2013, 36% of all cattle voyages returned a nil mortality rate.

• There were 9,691 cattle exported by air. Of these, 0.69% died during the flights, which was higher than 2012 (0.01%).

• There were 1,776 goats exported by sea during 2013. Of these, one died (0.06%). This compared all being successfully delivered to their destinations in 2012.

• There were 74,484 goats exported by air. Of these, 0.012% died during the flights. This compared all being successfully delivered to their destinations in 2012.

Benefits to industry

Ongoing analysis of the performance of the Australian livestock export industry, especially in areas of key interest such as the welfare of animals, provides valuable data that enables continued improvement in management practices.

Future research and recommendations

It is recommended that this project continue to be funded and reported on an annual basis.