MEDIA RELEASE: Government Asleep at the Wheel as National Abattoir Crisis Deepens

***For Immediate Release: 15 January 2025***

While the federal and state governments are asleep at the wheel, farmers across Australia have been repeatedly hit by the loss of access to abattoirs, posing a genuine threat to Australian food security and food sovereignty. Decades of industry consolidation has been followed by several multinational acquisitions, leaving small-scale farmers with few, if any, remaining slaughter options. Six abattoirs have closed their doors to service kills in just the last four months: Cowra, Booyong and Canowindra in NSW, DBC and Tammin in WA, and Hardwicks in Victoria.

What would the complete disappearance of small-scale livestock farmers mean? Rural communities would be further gutted by the loss of family farms, accelerating a trend that started with de-regulation of agricultural industries from the 1980s onwards.

Knowing where your meat comes from will be a thing of the past, as there will be no local meat in butcher’s shops or on restaurant menus, let alone direct from farmers. Independent butchers will struggle to survive if abattoirs stop selling them small lots of whole carcasses, instead pushing butchers to buy boxed meat cut up in the abattoirs’ wholesale boning rooms. As has already happened in the US and elsewhere, we are on the cusp of losing the craft of whole-carcass butchery and knowledgeable and skilled butchers to service high streets across Australia. Local abattoir and cold chain transport jobs will also disappear as multinationals import labour and export most of the meat.

The Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA), the 15-year-old peak body representing smallholders and their allies across the food system, has been warning governments of the predictable outcome of their outdated and destructive focus on export for over a decade. In a country that exports 72 percent of what is produced, what happens when that figure reaches 90 percent? What do politicians expect us to eat if farmers don’t have access to the basic infrastructure that is intrinsic to agriculture – abattoirs, boning rooms, dairy processing and grain mills.

AFSA farmer focal point Dr Tammi Jonas, a heritage-breed pig and cattle farmer whose husband Stuart is currently building a micro-abattoir on their farm, says, ‘It is infuriating to know that AFSA have been submitting proposed reforms for about 7 years, but could not get any traction until there was a crisis. We desperately hope it is not too late for the hundreds of farmers affected by Hardwicks’ (owned by multinational Kilcoy) decision to kick small-scale farmers out in December, and those impacted by DBC’s decision in WA with nowhere to turn.’

‘While ministers for agriculture and primary industry across Australia assure us they are concerned over the situation we are in, they appear to lack the political will to act decisively to save the flourishing sector of family farms who sell their meat directly through hundreds of farmers’ markets, local butcher’s shops, and community-supported agriculture subscriptions. They tell us it is difficult to move quickly in government, but smallholders don’t have any choice. Quick action is all that will save them.’

In the face of unprecedented cost of living pressures on Australian families, ongoing government inaction resulting in further consolidation of meat production and sale into the hands of a supermarket duopoly who decide what we can eat and the price we pay is unacceptable. Local food provides Australians with healthy and ecologically-sound choices for their families and strengthens rural economies. All these matters were highlighted in the 2023 parliamentary inquiry into Australian Food Security, which included specific recommendations aimed at fostering localised food systems. The Government is yet to respond to this report, and consumers as well as small-scale farmers are suffering.

In Victoria, AFSA has a live e-petition calling for the Government to urgently implement the recommendation in the report from the Inquiry into Securing the Victorian Food Supply to define micro-abattoirs and recognise them as rural industry in the planning scheme, which is an ancillary use that does not require a planning permit to develop. AFSA has also asked for an emergency application of the existing Game Meat Standards, to allow domestic livestock to be killed in the paddock and moved quickly to refrigeration before inspection by a licensed Meat Inspector, producing safe meat as assured under that standard for game. There is already precedent in jurisdictions of Australia who lack access to slaughter in conventional abattoirs. A similar petition is live in Tasmania, and others will be ready soon for every state in the nation. AFSA is also conducting a national survey of small-scale livestock farmers’ access to abattoirs.

‘We need national collaboration from all levels of government to understand the state of abattoirs – who owns them, who is losing access and the urgent action needed to save local food before it’s too late,’ said Jonas.

AFSA has compiled a critical resource for communities on how to establish a meat collective in their region, which is available to all AFSA members. If you would like to access this, please become a member.

-ENDS-

Contact: Dr Tammi Jonas, 0422 429 362

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About the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA)

The Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA) is a farmer-led civil society organisation of people working together towards socially-just and ecologically-sound food and agriculture systems that foster the democratic participation of First Peoples, smallholders, and local communities in decision making processes. Website: afsa.org.au

Published On: 15 January, 2025Categories: Agroecology, Media Releases, NewsTags: , ,