In short:
A live export vessel has been waiting for four weeks for clearance to sail to Israel from Fremantle.
The 4,000 head of cattle are not on the ship, they’re being held in quarantine facilities, ready for loading.
What’s next?
Farmers say the cattle can be processed locally or sent to other markets if approval is not given.
A consignment of 4,000 cattle due to be shipped to Israel has been waiting a month for approval from Australia’s live export regulator to depart Fremantle.
The cattle were due to sail to Israel around South Africa to avoid the conflict-prone Red Sea, where Houthi forces have been attacking global shipping passing through the Gulf of Aden.
But it’s understood security concerns about a location in northern Israel where the ship was to unload have stalled clearance from the Department of Agriculture.
The MV Bahijah remains at anchor off the WA coast, unable to begin the 33-day journey.
In a statement, a Department of Agriculture spokesperson said it did not comment on specific live export applications.
“Applications to export consignments of livestock are assessed by the department in accordance with the requirements of the Export Control Act 2020 and associated legislation,” the spokesperson said.
Cattle producer and WAFarmers Livestock Section president Geoff Pearson said the cattle were being held in three different registered premises, ready for loading.
“Given the unrest in Israel at the moment the risk assessment has to be made, and the department aren’t able to give the Bahijah the go ahead to reload,” he said.
Mr Pearson said if approval was not given, plan B would need to be activated, where some cattle would be processed locally or diverted to other markets.
He said Israel would have to look elsewhere for its meat until the security situation improved.
“There is a massive want for sheep and cattle in Israel at the moment,” he said.
“The price of red meat has skyrocketed and there is a very short supply so the demand is there. If they can’t get it from Australia they’ll source it from other countries.”
It’s the Bajijah’s second recent shipping delay to the region, with the vessel turned back from the Red Sea in January while loaded with WA sheep and cattle.
The ship was eventually reloaded in March, and arrived safely in Israel in April.
Just 2,728 head of cattle have been shipped to Israel this year, compared to more than 70,000 last year.
Important market
It had been an important year-round market for local farmers, drawing cattle from the Pilbara to Esperance and taking younger yearling cattle made up of predominantly young bulls for feedlotting.
Gascoyne pastoralist Hamish McTaggart will start mustering soon and is nervously watching the situation.
In previous years, about three quarters of his cattle were exported to Israel.
“It’s a good market for the WA cattle industry, it tends to be a price setter for people that are mustering later in the year,” he said.
“They look after the cattle very well there with good systems right through the supply chain.
“For a person selling cattle into that market, you have a lot of confidence that your cattle are being looked after.”
He said he was likely to look to Indonesia as an alternative market, but was hopeful trade with Israel would resume.
“I hope for everybody’s sake that market opens up again and continues to be strong so Israeli and Middle Eastern people can get the protein that they need,” he said.
Brazil shipments replacing Australian cattle
Global meat trade analyst Simon Quilty from Agritrends said, of the 360,000 head of cattle exported live out of Australia so far this year, the bulk had sailed to Indonesia and Vietnam.
He said conflict and the danger of travelling through the Red Sea, combined with improved cattle prices and falling oil prices meant there had been a sharp drop in Australian cattle exported to the Middle East.
“The issues of exporting to the Middle East with the conflict that’s going on, and the additional time on the water that’s required if you have to go around Africa, has meant the trade out of Australia has been truly challenged,” he said.
But he said in contrast, Brazil had significantly increased its live cattle exports to Israel, shipping 184,000 head in six months this year, in comparison to 137,000 shipped for all of last year.
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