Northern Australia’s cattle industry leaders are confident politicians are on their side in the wake of the federal government’s decision to ban live sheep exports from mid-2028.
Northern Australia’s cattle industry leaders are confident politicians are on their side in the wake of the federal government’s decision to ban live sheep exports from mid-2028.
During and since that decision, cemented by Labor’s federal election win this year, there have been some rumblings the cattle trade may be targeted by activist groups next.
Speaking at LiveCorp and Australian Livestock Exporters’ Council’s 2025 LiveXchange forum in Perth on Thursday, Heytesbury Pastoral Company owner Paul Holmes à Court said confidence in the live export cattle industry was high.
“We feel it's quite secure, and we take the various governments and what they say about live exports of cattle seriously,” he said.
“There is always going to be the crazies and the extremists and they can be very vocal, they can be very influential, and politically, they can be a problem, and we can't ignore that.
“But the grownups in the middle, if you like, are the ones that we continue to have a conversation with.”
Mr Holmes a Court said the industry’s bigger threat came from within, in keeping up investment in long-term assets such as ships to sustain the sector.
That notion was backed by Australian Capital Equity chief operating officer Travis Robinson.
Both cattle industry leaders used the example of live export ships, which they said cost about $50 million to build, had a lifespan of three decades, and struggled to attract financing due to short offtake deals.
“The industry doesn't have to worry about the government banning it, it has to worry about it just running out of infrastructure,” Mr Robinson said.
“It would be an industry that fizzles out rather than gets shut down so we need that stability, certainty, consistency of support for the industry and a consistent regulatory environment.
“Then, then the investment will come.”
Frontier International sales manager Tony Gooden said institutional investors were wary of investing in the industry due to the cancellation of the live sheep trade.
“As an industry, we need to ensure that there's unequivocal support from the government so that we can have long term investment and really maximize this business for the benefit of all the stakeholders,” he said.
Heytesbury and the Kerry Stokes-backed ACE collectively hold leases over more than 1.5 hectares of pastoral country in the Kimberley.
Eye on Indo
Mr Robinson, who also serves as the Australia Indonesia Business Council WA chapter chairman, said there was still plenty of growth for the live cattle trade in Indonesia.
He said Indonesia president Prabowo Subianto’s ambitious economic platform and food security ideas could bode well for Australian exporters.
“You will have somebody in an Indonesian village in the middle of Java who has nothing, who will eat rice and vegetables every day, the quantity is the same,” he said.
“When that family gets a little bit more money, they will start eating maybe some tofu or tempeh. Then they will move to chicken, fish, and then beef.
“As Indonesia's economy grows and expands, so will the demand for beef.”
Mr Robinson said there was plenty of interest from Indonesia in Australian dairy cows.
Indonesia could play a role in processing Australian cattle too, according to Mr Holmes a Court.
“Right now in Australia, whether we like it or not, unfortunately, labour and energy costs are not favourable,” he said.
“[It] is a four-and-a-half-day shipment to Jakarta, where you have got a massive population, their energy costs are probably one-tenth of ours, their labor costs maybe one-twentieth.
“I can actually see a vision of a lot more cattle going to Indonesia get value-added – processed – there in modern supply chains and perhaps re-exported to other Muslim countries around the world.”
Mr Holmes a Court said that would follow the trend of other Australian resources exports which are processed in Asia.
