THE reputation of Australian beef is expected to take a hammering in the weeks ahead as Coalition Senators and a producer rebellion intensifies their rhetoric in the push to exclude the importation of US beef.
Queensland Nationals Senator Barnaby Joyce and NSW Liberal Senator Bill Heffernan gave an insight of things to come for the industry on Saturday when they played to about 800 beef producers in Armidale, many angry at the Rudd Government’s decision to allow beef imports from countries previously infected with BSE, commonly known as mad cow disease.
Promoted as a "new direction" for Australian beef, the meeting chaired by Sydney shock-jock radio announcer Alan Jones quickly dissolved into a downward spiral of grievances, with producers blaming dwindling returns, poor prices, retailer margins, bureaucracy and the Rudd Government for plunging their industry into crisis.
Chief organiser JR McDonald demanded the representatives of Australia’s peak red meat industry bodies, particularly those on the boards of MLA, Cattle Council and the Red Meat Advisory Council be sacked and replaced.
MLA managing director David Palmer, who attended the meeting and spoke on a panel with MLA chairman Don Heatley, called the meeting a "disgrace".
"It was a lost opportunity to engage in meaningful dialogue that will take our industry forward," he said.
Meanwhile the centrepiece of the meeting – the unveiling of JR McDonald’s and NSW Independent Richard Torbay’s meat grading system, which proposes to label old cow beef as low quality – was swamped by the BSE import hysteria gripping some sectors of the industry.
Senator Joyce urged those in the crowd to spread the message about the dangers posed by US beef to pave the way for the Coalition’s private members bill through the Senate, proposing that exporting countries install Australian-equivalent testing regimes and traceability standards.
Australia imposed its ban in 2001 following several cases of BSE.
Under the new rules, only imports of muscle meat, or products of muscle meat, that is not infected with BSE will be allowed into Australia.
Fresh beef also must receive clearance from Biosecurity Australia.
Australia also is requiring exporters to meet or exceed that country's traceability standards.
AgForce Cattle president Grant Maudsley says he will have no problems eating US beef if it comes into the country under current protocols - it's the Coalition's aggressive posturing that he finds hard to stomach.
The Mitchell cattle producer was among a sizeable Queensland contingent at Saturday's beef forum in Armidale, and what he heard from the meeting's organisers and Coalition Senators Joyce and Heffernan both appalled and terrified him.
"It was a total lynch mob mentality whipped up by populist retail politics," he said. "I understand why the politicians are doing it, they want to elevate their profile, but I still find it disappointing.
"If Barnaby Joyce wants to talk up the risk posed by US beef he's risking domestic consumption in the first instance and by extension Australian exports if he gets his way."
In an interview after Saturday's meeting, Senator Joyce conceded there was the potential to undermine the reputation of Australian beef by talking up the risks of US beef to consumers.
However, he said winning tighter import controls on US beef would outweigh the negatives.
"There is a risk there and people have to be mindful of that. But the only way you can truly allay people's fears is by implementing a transparent form of analysis that they can see and have confidence in," he said.
Senator Joyce rejected suggestions that he was generating a scare campaign to score political points against the beleaguered Rudd Government.
"You might want to call it a scare campaign, I call it lobbying," he said.
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