Ramadan – not Rudd – the reason for extra beef

A Pilbara pastoralist has welcomed Indonesia’s mayday call for extra cattle but says returning Prime Minister Kevin Rudd deserves “no credit”.

In a surprise move on July 18, Jakarta announced it needed an additional 25,000 cattle over the next three months and lifted a 350kg weight limit.

Indonesia is preparing for an important festival to mark the end of Ramadan and beef is in high demand.

Visiting Indonesia earlier this month, Mr Rudd pushed for the country to lift beef import quotas.

But Michael Thompson, who owns Mundabullangana Station, south of Port Hedland, said the gesture was a “spit in the ocean” compared to previous live trade levels.

Australia was exporting more than 500,000 cattle a year to Indonesia before the Federal Government’s snap ban on the trade in 2011 over animal welfare concerns.

This year’s quota was set at 267,000.

“It’s not through good government that Indonesia is buying the 25,000 from us,” Mr Thompson said. “Don’t think that Rudd has changed things in Indonesia because he’s our new Prime Minster – he was part of the Cabinet that buried us.

“As far as I’m concerned he deserves no credit. They’re short of cattle because of Ramadan.”

Mr Thompson said Indonesia had been “insulted” by the ban but he hoped the recent announcement would slowly reopen a dialogue while also bumping up the domestic price of beef.

“It might be the start of things improving over there,” he said.

“I just had a phone call from an Indonesian this morning wanting some guidance on buying property in Australia. There are a lot of positive vibes out there but we’ve got two years to catch up on so it would want to be real good.”

Mr Thompson said the Pilbara’s unseasonably wet weather in recent months had left producers in good stead. He expected to have more than 1000 bulls on a Port Hedland ship this week.

The cattle shipment is the first to leave Port Hedland in 12 months.

A port spokesman confirmed the vessel would depart for Fremantle with approximately 8000 head of cattle. The final destination is expected to be the Middle East.

Mr Thompson said growing demand for Australian beef in China and Vietnam meant “things were looking up” for cattle farmers who managed to survive the fallout of the Indonesian live export ban.