The Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry has completed its review of live sheep exported by sea to, or through, the Middle East during the Northern Hemisphere summer (1 May to 31 October).
The final report is now available on the department’s webpage.
The review assessed the effectiveness of regulatory settings implemented in 2020 in protecting exported sheep from the risk of heat stress on voyages to the Middle East during the Northern Hemisphere summer.
The review concluded that regulatory settings introduced in 2020 reduced, but did not eliminate, the risk of heat stress for sheep exported to the Middle East and improved animal welfare outcomes.
The review also concluded that to maintain the welfare of exported sheep, an absolute prohibition period during the hottest, most humid part of the Northern Hemisphere summer should remain.
The review makes several recommendations to improve or maintain animal welfare. These include that sheep should be fed a minimum of 3% of their liveweight daily while on vessels travelling to, or through the Middle East during the non-prohibited periods of the Northern Hemisphere summer and that each vessel exporting sheep must deploy a minimum of 1 data logger on the bridge to record ambient wet bulb temperature. This is in addition to the requirement for environmental recording on decks holding sheep under current rules. These recommendations will be implemented by the department.
The review makes several date related recommendations to reduce the prohibition period during the Northern Hemisphere summer to certain destinations where heat stress risks are less than previously understood. These recommendations will not be implemented.
In undertaking the review, the department considered an updated climatology analysis based on 42 years of accumulated data from the Bureau of Meteorology, health and welfare information and mortality data from 15 voyages that occurred during the Northern Hemisphere summer months from 2019 to 2021, an analysis of data from environmental data loggers placed on sheep decks and stakeholder feedback.
