Stop Live Exports

30/10/2026

The world wants Australian sheepmeat. Overwhelmingly, it wants it chilled and boxed, not live.

Farm Weekly reports on the latest export market updates from Meat & Livestock Australia, presented at a WA industry meeting in Katanning:

🌍 Across the Middle East and North Africa, Australia supplied 63% of imported boxed sheepmeat in 2025, but just 4% of live sheep imports.

📈 Even with conflict disrupting trade routes, demand in the region hasn’t disappeared.

In the UK, Australia’s share of the sheepmeat market has grown from 2–3% to about 7% since 2020, following the UK–Australia Free Trade Agreement.

Malaysia is now the third-largest market for Australian sheepmeat in the world, behind China and the US.

We often hear that overseas markets can’t do without our live sheep. The figures tell a different story.

Every sheep processed here is one that never has to make that long journey by sea, and stays under Australian animal welfare law from start to finish.

Keeping animals here also supports Australian jobs and keeps that value in regional communities.

The phase-out of live sheep exports by sea is law from 1 May 2028. Until then, sheep are still being loaded onto ships, and cattle and other animals are still being exported. We’ll keep speaking up for them until no animal is shipped live from Australia. 🧡

👉 The live export lobby says overseas markets need our live sheep. Their own industry’s figures say otherwise. Share the facts.

29/10/2026

Tonight's the night! We look forward to welcoming our members online for the Stop Live Exports Annual General Meeting 🧡

🗓️ Tonight, Thursday 29 October
🕒 5:30–6:30pm AWST (8:00pm Adelaide / 8:30pm Sydney & Melbourne)
💻 Fully online via Google Meet

A quick heads-up in case you missed it in your inbox: the AGM has moved fully online this year

Members, your joining details are in your email. If you can't find them, send us a message and we'll help you get connected.

27/10/2026

Australia's national animal welfare strategy has been out of date for more than a decade. Now there's a new draft, and you can have your say.

The Federal Government has released a full draft of the renewed Australian Animal Welfare Strategy for its third and final round of public consultation. It's the national framework meant to guide how animals are protected across the country, including the animals still being shipped live from our ports.

If live export matters to you, say so. Tell them that enforceable heat protections, and an end to live export, belong in Australia's animal welfare future.

👉 Have your say by 5pm AEDT (2pm in WA) on Friday 13 November. You can do a short survey, write a submission, or both:
https://haveyoursay.agriculture.gov.au/aaws

Every response is on the record. Together, we can make sure animals are part of this conversation.

Share your feedback on the renewed Australian Animal Welfare Strategy (AAWS).

26/10/2026

New live export rules start on 9 December. 📋

The updated Australian Standards for the Export of Livestock (ASEL 3.4) change the requirements for pregnancy checks, pen space and fodder on board.

What's still missing? A temperature limit for loading. There is still no rule stopping animals being loaded for export when it's 35°C or hotter.

Summer is almost here. Petition 086 is now before the WA Parliament, asking for five simple protections, starting with no loading at or above 35°C.

35°C is the line. Help us make it law: https://chuffed.org/project/173018-make-it-law-35c-is-the-line

22/10/2026

"What do you need donations for?" Here's a real example.

When the MV Jawan was sent through the Red Sea, an active conflict zone, we asked the Department of Agriculture a simple question: was there a plan for the animals on board?

We asked for the contingency and diversion plan, the security risk assessment, and records of extra feed and water. Those supplies would be essential if the ship had to divert and take a much longer route.

The answer so far? A bill for $384.52. We asked for the fee to be reduced or waived in the public interest. That was refused.

This is what accountability costs. No government body is going to hand over these answers for free, so it's your support that pays for us to keep asking.

We're paying it. We'll share what we find.

Help us keep asking the hard questions 👉 https://chuffed.org/project/173018-make-it-law-35c-is-the-line

21/10/2026

🐄 Moving meat, not animals: what a new European study found

A study by CREDA researchers in Barcelona, commissioned by Eurogroup for Animals, compared Ireland's live exports of unweaned calves to Spain with finishing the calves in Ireland and sending meat or carcasses instead. The findings will sound familiar to anyone who has followed live export here in WA 👇

🚛 Calves exported live, usually at just two to four weeks old, face around 48 hours of transport and six handling events. Finished and processed in Ireland, it's about 2 hours and two handling events.

⚠️ The study estimates cumulative transport mortality of 2.97% for live calves, compared with 0.01% under the meat trade model, and notes the true figure for live exports is likely higher.

💰 Exporting carcasses came out as the lowest-cost supply chain of the options studied.

🛒 Most consumers surveyed agreed farm animals deserve protection from pain and distress.

🤝 The researchers also recommend just transition policies to manage the impact on affected regions, the same principle we stand by for WA farmers.

Different country, same lesson: trade can thrive without animals making the journey. Australia has legislated an end to live sheep exports by sea from 1 May 2028, but cattle and other animals are still being shipped.

🔗 Read the study: https://www.eurogroupforanimals.org/library/live-calf-exports-versus-carcass-trade-model-economic-welfare-and-policy-considerations

19/10/2026

Our submission is in. 🏛️

Petition 086, signed by 1,449 Western Australians, asks the WA Parliament for five protections for animals in the live export supply chain. It's now with the Legislative Council's Standing Committee on Environment and Public Affairs, and Stop Live Exports has made a formal submission in support.

Our submission sets out the evidence for:

1️⃣ No loading at or above 35°C
2️⃣ Clean drinking water until loading
3️⃣ Shade for animals waiting at port
4️⃣ Trucks leaving as soon as they're loaded, and animals unloaded promptly at port
5️⃣ Feed and bedding throughout transport

It isn't only WA asking. A federal e-petition seeking the same protections closed with 1,675 confirmed signatures, and a Change.org petition of more than 470,000 signatures was presented to Federal Parliament by Andrew Wilkie MP in September.

Thank you to everyone who signed, and to the Hon Amanda Dorn MLC for tabling the petition. Now we wait for the Committee, and keep the pressure on.

Support the campaign: https://chuffed.org/project/173018-make-it-law-35c-is-the-line

19/10/2026

🚨 HAPPENING NOW — BROOME, WA

🌡️ 31°C TEMPERATURE
💧 64% HUMIDITY

⚠️ THI: 81.8 — SEVERE HEAT STRESS RISK

These conditions can place cattle under significant heat stress, even before the additional demands of handling and loading onto live export vessels.

Heat stress is an animal welfare issue. It shouldn’t be ignored.

🐄 STOP LIVE EXPORTS.

16/10/2026

We asked a simple question. We still don't have an answer. 🚢

In August, the live export ship MV Jawan sailed from Fremantle to Jordan, through the Red Sea and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, where a vessel had been attacked just weeks earlier.

On 29 August, we wrote to the Department of Agriculture and Minister Collins with one urgent question: what is the plan to protect the animals on board if the ship can't pass safely?

The reply came almost four weeks later, after the ship was due in Jordan. It didn't answer the question. Instead, we were told to lodge a Freedom of Information request.

So we have, and we'll share what we find.

No ship carrying thousands of animals should sail into a conflict zone without a clear plan. When a direct question about animal safety goes unanswered, it's one more reason this trade has to end.

More details here: https://stopliveexports.org/mv-jawan-red-sea-safety-question/

📷 MV Jawan in Fremantle, 2024. Photo: Debra Edmonds

14/10/2026

NSW is about to become the first state in Australia with an independent Office of Animal Welfare. 🐾

The NSW Government has introduced a Bill to create the Office. It will give independent advice, investigate public complaints about how animal welfare laws are enforced, and oversee the public funding of enforcement bodies.

Independent oversight matters. When the same department that promotes animal industries also polices how those animals are treated, animals lose.

WA Labor promised WA an Independent Office of Animal Welfare years ago. It's in their own party platform. It still hasn't happened.

Live export ships still load at Fremantle and Broome. If any state needs independent oversight of animal welfare, it's this one.

NSW has shown it can be done. WA, it's your turn. Keep your promise.

Read more: https://www.insidestategovernment.com.au/nsw-to-establish-independent-office-of-animal-welfare/