*I'd suggest that the livestock industry and the animal welfare movement would be pretty much
mutually exclusive.*

Nicky, I’d suggest that you are wrong. I’d suggest that you simply don’t understand
the industry or what motivates people. I’d suggest that if somebody was about to take
your little degree away from you, or your house, that you might protest like hell. If
they screwed you in the process, you would protest even louder.

If people want to make money, they become lawyers, doctors, investment bankers or
insurance people, not farmers. I know a great many farmers who love the lifestyle
and love animals, but they have to deal with reality. If the budget does not add up,
they get sold up by banks. They make sure that does not happen, yet many still get
sold up. So they fight like hell, against a system which is stacked against them, by
you suburbanites, who make the rules.

What enormous largesses? I remind you that agriculture pays huge amounts
of taxes and generates huge amounts of wealth. Why should it not get some of that
back? Why should it all be given to the car industry, the film industry etc?

Your examples of cattle mistreatment in the ME only highlight my point. With
proper equipment, none of this need happen. They have to learn from somewhere,
its not going to come as a flash, in the middle of the night. If the so called animal
welfare groups supported the concept, I am sure that would help convince Govt that
a tiny fraction of their overseas aid budget, which is in the billions, could be used for
animal welfare. But of course animal liberation groups are not the same as animal
welfare groups.

*Now we just have to get them all shot down ...*

Now now Nicky, violence is not the answer :)

Hi all
Yabby, my sweet, that was one of my (infrequent) typos. It was intended to read "shut down".

Tell us WHY the meat processing industry in WA is so bad that you can't get as much money as the live export agents offer, and what we can do about it. Tell us also what you've done about it, because I (deep down, and the same goes for you, Rojo) can't believe that you really want to send your animals on live exports and that it's really the best option for you or for them.

You don't need me to tell you, of course, you are also exporting the "down stream" processing advantages. How is it that the Eastern states are apparently not so reliant upon that option? Then perhaps people would want to help. I don't think that any of the "animal libber" groups are unrealistic enough to believe that they will stop people eating meat, in this lifetime at least. Importing migrants doesn't seem to be the answer, and contrary to PALE's opinion, I don't think the government has any greater obligation to train migrants or indigenous people more it does than anyone else. There is strong evidence to suggest that "skilled" migrant abattoir workers bring their cruel practices with them.

Tell us what the answers are and let's try and work a bit constructively to address them. I appreciate that many of you love your lifestyles and some of you even love your animals but there have to be better ways than this.

My degrees (which I have paid for) are unlikely to be taken from me. Nor is my house, because I plan. I don't breed more animals than I can care for properly and I wouldn't have put myself in a position in which I rely on immoral means to deal with the excess animals such as live exports. But I recognize that my life has taken a different path.
(Continues)

Cheers
Nicky

(Continued from last post)

One thing I know for sure, the answers do NOT lie in the "pretend" training in importing countries delivered by a handful of people who are basically animal abusers themselves. And they have had DECADES to do something about this, and are only doing it now because they have been caught out so often. Rojo, it has nothing to do with religious intolerance or dogma and everything to do with moral standards that no-one, anywhere should be able to brutalize animals and if they do, you stop providing them when you know that's what is going to happen.

Cheers
Nicky

Ok Nicky, I will tell you why the WA meat industry is so bad, although I have
mentioned it all before on OLO.

The WA meat commission was active until about the year 2000, when the industry
was finally deregulated. It was illegal to export lamb from WA until that time, as
they were given the monopoly on lamb exports. Such amazing people as Laurie Connell ( a well known crook) were on its board. Now anything run by Govt,
that has a monopoly and no incentive to do anything, does not do anything, as there
is no competition. People could look out the windows all day, they still got paid.

So nobody ever invested seriously in the WA meat industry, as happened in the Eastern States. Two major plants were closed down, as they were old and stuffed
and union problems dominated their daily running.

Monty House deregulated the industry at the time and it was a great achievement.
As part of that deregulation, he encouraged Roger Fletcher to come to WA and open
a large efficient plant, held his hand and provided some Govt funds for it all to
happen. Facilitation by Govt can open all sorts of doors, when dealing with 35 or
so Govt Depts, to get through all the red tape. Kim Chance, (then in opposition)
was Monty’s major critic at the time.

The Govt changed, which did not give Monty time to bring in any serious competitor
to Fletcher, and Kim Chance, given his criticism of Monty, was not about to wear
egg on his face, so he did nothing.

So to this day, Fletcher has a monopoly on large scale efficient mutton production.
If Fletcher bids 20$, there is nobody to seriously compete with him. Thus our mutton
values are well below Eastern States values.

Now we have the resources boom in WA, so everyone is heading for the mines, for
huge money. Why should they work in a meatworks, when they can make three
times as much, sitting in an air-conditioned truck?

WA needs large efficient operators and it needs staff from-overseas.

Hi all
Okay Yabby. I didn't know the exact history, so thanks for that. So how do we fix it? If the frozen meat trade is worth as much as it is, where is all that frozen meat being sent from? What exactly took place in the Eastern states that didn't take place in WA? How has Fletcher maintained his monopoloy, because presumably his workers are AMIEU members.

I read somewhere that a large Brazilian corporation has bought out abattoirs in Victoria and Tasmania. I brought the latter to the attention of PALE, but the next news was that it had all been brought out by this Brazilian operation.

There must be a way around such a mess, because in all honesty you guys (and I say this totally without malice) will have to work through it because sending live animals WILL stop one day.

The resources boom will also end one day too, and the jobs there are finite. And who is to say that if they bring in migrant workers they won't leave whatever they start out doing and go and work in the mines too? It's like saying that they will stay in rural and regional areas - they don't; they go to the major centres after a period of time.

Cheers
Nicky

Nicky, the bulk of the frozen/chilled export meat comes from the
Eastern States, where there is healthy competition between operators.

Yes, the Tasman Group was bought by the Brazilians, who now
call themselves Swift. Globally they are extemely efficient, with markets
eveywhere. They employ 70'000 people world wide and are pretty good
at value adding. They would be welcomed in WA, as an efficient and
competitive operator, with access to global markets, unlike our
local mob, who are fast asleep and really don't give a stuff, as
they have a captive market for anything that is not exported live.

The present resources boom is only just beginning, you are talking
150 years or more of resources that China, India etc all want,
from iron-ore, nickel, gold, to gas. Half of Australia's exports
come from the 10% of the population here.

Really our problem is political, for the present Govt know that they
can win elections based on metropolitan seats and can largely
ignore country areas. So the books are full of new projects,
from libraries, foreshore developments, football stadiums, railway
lines in the suburbs, but agriculture has been written off, as mining
provides the $ and the city provides the votes.

457 workers are obliged to stay with their employers, for their
4 years of contract duration. So nope, they can't run off to
join mining, but still get paid in a month, what they can earn in
a year back home. Life is relative after all