Abattoir closures threaten vital, local food systems

(This piece was posted on 17th September. On 26th September we added a short postscript at the end.)

Most of us know very little about how our meat gets from the farm to the fridge and we’re happy to leave it that way.

But there’s an abattoir crisis happening right now that threatens rural communities and your access to delicious, healthy meat from regeneratively-managed farms.

So if you eat food and you have any interest in food security, short supply chains and a healthy, sustainable, local meat industry then it’s time for you to sit up and take notice!

For 15 years we’ve watched as, one after another, the small, local abattoirs that serve small and medium-scale farmers across the country close down in the face of the increasing costs and corporate consolidation. The remaining abattoirs are mostly focussed on volume and export and are not interested in doing small, ‘private’ kills. So when the local abattoir closes or stops doing private kills, communities of farmers are left stranded with very few options.

These days, the next nearest abattoir that will do private kills is usually a punishing distance away, adding prohibitive cost and stress for both farmers and animals. Alternatively, farmers might opt to sell their animals into the undifferentiated, commodity market, where multiple animals from many different farms are processed together and sold according to category and size with no value attached to breed, animal husbandry or farming practice. This is an unsatisfactory result for farmers who have spent years regenerating their farms and building a brand and a market for their unique product.

In some cases, abattoir closures and the ripple effects are prompting producers to leave livestock farming altogether.

As a farm-direct, whole animal butcher, acting as a shock absorber between farmers and customers, we can vouch for the stress that abattoir closures cause farmers and local communities.

But it doesn't just affect farmers and butchers, it impacts you too.

Because, without abattoirs serving communities of small to medium farmers, there is less transparency about the source of your meat and fewer regenerative farmers growing delicious food, repairing landscapes, fostering biodiversity and mitigating against the impacts of climate change. Ultimately, there will be less of that healthy, local meat for you.

We’ve spoken about this a lot over the years, but while it remains a ‘farmer problem’, rather than a 'food system problem', things won’t change. It’s time for consumers to enter the fray and stand shoulder to shoulder with the people who grow our food.

We urgently need an ACCC review of the Australian meat processing industry as well as a comprehensive, coherent National Food Policy that knits together all the disparate issues and ensures the security and viability of our world-famous, local food industry.

POSTSCRIPT : 26 September

Some people have written to us asking what actions they can take. Here's my response which I hope is helpful.

It's true that our piece about abattoirs asked consumers to 'enter the fray' but  didn’t contain specific suggestions or guidance about what consumers can do.

Ordinarily, I’d be hesitant to write something like this that specifically encourages action without offering a way for people to act. But I’m afraid that, in this case, time and resources prohibited organising something specific and I decided to go ahead anyway, because I think it’s an important issue that we all need to know about.

The instagram story and the piece in our newsletter received a surprisingly big response though, so we'll definitely follow up with more about this issue and ideally something concrete in terms of action.

But for now, in the absence of a well-organised campaign or initiative, I suggest the most powerful thing you can do is be really well informed and use your purchasing and political power to the best effect.

For example...

1. Educate yourself about the meat processing industry. Read the ’slaughter’ chapter in our book, The Ethical Omnivore.
2. Do a little online research about abattoirs to familiarise yourself with the issues. Explain it to your friends - chances are they won’t know anything about it and information is power.
3. Hold your meat retailers accountable. Ask them where the animals come from, how and where they’re killed, how many steps in the supply chain?
4. Reward retailers who care and can empower you with detailed, substantiated information.
5. Your purchases create demand which encourages production. Make sure you're prompting the kind of production you care about.
6. Find out about the agricultural / food policies of your preferred politicians. If there’s nothing about the supply chain, including abattoirs, then write to them and ask why not? (Unfortunately, it’s likely there won't be much except motherhood statements about food security and you’ll be hard pressed to find anything resembling a coherent food policy.)

We hope this helps.

Photo of Spider, the meat carter, by Alan Benson for our book, The Ethical Omnivore which contains an entire chapter about slaughter.