Kuwait, Aussie livestock trade in jeopardy

This news has been read 9651 times!

KUWAIT CITY, May 21: Osama Boodai, chief executive officer of Livestock Transport and Trading Company (Al-Mawashi), the largest importer of Australian live sheep has revealed his company is looking for other sources to supply livestock to Kuwait following Australia’s talk about slapping a ban on livestock trade, reports Al-Rai daily. The Australian newspaper Newcastle Herald, quoting Boodai said the livestock trade is a matter of national food security for his country.

He had spoken candidly about the issues being hotly debated in Australia, providing extensive explanation around why the trade cannot simply be replaced with boxed meat in the face of Muslim cultural beliefs on animal slaughter.

What will likely contradict the views of many Australians is what they believe in that their animal welfare beliefs are superior. He says many customers in Kuwait do not believe it is good welfare to use a stunner device on an animal and then slaughter it. Boodai is emphatic that those in the Middle East were also outraged at the footage on board sheep ships, which read ‘Those conditions were not acceptable to any of us’.

Boodai has just visited Australia to talk to politicians and farmers about the reality of conditions on livestock vessels. Al-Mawashi, which incorporates the Kuwait Livestock Transport and Trading, is a majority government-owned business focused on food security rather than maximizing profits, he explained.

This news has been read 9651 times!