July 4, 2011

 

Australia's organic beef sales increase

 

 

Sales of organic meat are rising because the treatment of Australian cattle overseas has caused shoppers to look for more ethical options.

 

One organic meat shop in the Brisbane region has recorded a 10% rise in sales in the weeks since graphic footage showing the cruel treatment of Australian cattle in Indonesian slaughterhouses aired on Four Corners, according to the media.

 

Butchers said they have been bombarded by questions about the source of their meat and how the cattle were treated before being sent to the abattoir.

 

Owner of the Meat-Ting Place at Paddington attributed the 10% increase in trade to the alarm over the footage.

 

"I had people asking questions left, right and centre," Steve Povey said.

 

"The Meat-ting Place can tell you exactly where its meat comes from, the names, the farms, whether it is lamb, pork or chicken.

 

"We would rather shut our doors if we had to go back to selling stuff we do not believe in."

 

Only beef from grass-fed cattle is sold, with staff able to show photographs of the farms for customers.

 

Boutique butcher James Starr of Brisbane's Kenmore's James' Connoisseur Meats said he had fielded constant questions since the Four Corners programme.

 

"I can tell you where my beef is grown, what breed it is, how much it weighed when it was slaughtered, what the fat content was, almost up to what name it went by," he said.

"If it is something like a mass produced grain feeding where they cannot move, I am not in favour of it."

 

A month after live cattle exports to Indonesia were suspended, the financial cost is mounting for national graziers still reeling after years of drought and natural disasters.