Queensland Agriculture Minister John McVeigh says he holds no animal welfare concerns about Australian live cattle exports to Indonesia as he pushes for an increase in trade.
Mr McVeigh is in Jakarta with his Northern Territory counterpart to lobby the Indonesian government.
Many Australian cattle producers are facing ruin from drought and plummeting prices caused by an oversupply at home.
Mr McVeigh says while they have not come to an agreement with Indonesia yet to increase the import quota, he is hopeful of a long-term solution.
"The banning of the live export trade for a period approximately two years ago by the Federal Labor Government certainly was the catalyst for this trip," he said.
"That was certainly the cause of a lot of concern and confusion amongst our Indonesian partners in the cattle industry.
"The visit by the Northern Territory Minister and myself this week is all about trying to start the process of mending the relationship."He says the approach has a long term focus.
"We've agreed with the ministers that we've met that a long term relationship has a number of features," he said.
"It's looking at a partnership approach wherein we look at where the Indonesian beef industry and consumption wants to go in the long term.
"Currently they consume in the order of 2.2 kilograms per head.
"The Indonesian government wants to grow that consumption for healthy lifestyle reasons.
"We've got an opportunity to help them do that when you establish a solid relationship and the issues they need to appreciate from our production perspective as well."
Animal welfare
Mr McVeigh says the visit was brought forward in light of some drought-stricken Queensland graziers considering shooting cattle.
"Following my declaration of a third of the state of Queensland being back under brought conditions just a few weeks ago, we've pulled forward the timing for this visit," he said
"We're very close neighbours to Indonesia and once we sweep all the politics aside, Indonesia has got a lot of consumers who want beef and Australia has got a magnificent capacity to supply once we get the basis of our relationship reset."
He says while animal welfare issues in other countries are important, they are isolated incidents.
"If anyone is found guilty of any form of animal cruelty at any supply chain around the world, they need to be accountable," he said.
"Those isolated incidents are no reason to bring an industry and regional communities such as those in north-west Queensland to their knees.
"I support the industry very strongly and my Indonesian colleagues are of a similar mind."
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