Port of Townsville handles record live cattle exports as Asia Pacific trade expandsUpdated

The Port of Townsville has recorded its highest ever live cattle export volume, with 480,000 head of cattle shipped through the port to Southeast Asian and Pacific feedlots and markets over the past year — a record that reflects both the recovery of Northern Queensland cattle stations from the drought-affected years of the early 2020s and the growth of Indonesian, Vietnamese, and Malaysian demand for Australian-breed cattle for their domestic livestock industries and food production systems.

The cattle trade is one of the most economically significant activities at the Port of Townsville and one of the most logistics-intensive, requiring specialised livestock handling infrastructure, veterinary inspection facilities, and water and feed supply for the animals during the embarkation period. The port's livestock export facilities are the largest in North Queensland and have been upgraded in recent years to accommodate the higher volumes and the biosecurity requirements of importing countries that have become more stringent following disease outbreak concerns in earlier periods.

North Queensland cattle station operators describe the Townsville port as their most critical piece of infrastructure — without it, the economics of live export from the north would collapse, and the alternative of road transport to southern ports would add transport cost and stress mortality that would eliminate the trade's profitability. Several large station operators have made their views on the port's strategic importance clear in their submissions to the federal government's Live Export Review.

The Port of Townsville Authority's capital investment program includes upgrades to the livestock precinct that will increase throughput capacity and improve animal welfare conditions during the embarkation process, responding to both volume growth and the tightening animal welfare standards that importing countries and Australian welfare advocates are requiring the industry to meet.

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