Australian cattle for Asia

Australian cattle for Asia

CANBERRA (AFP): Exports of live cattle to Southeast Asia jumped 53 percent to a record 290,000 head in 1994, the Australian Meat and Live-stock Corporation (AMLC) said yesterday.

AMLC chairman John Kerin said Australia's two biggest markets in the region, the Philippines and Indonesia, imported 127,000 and 120,000 head of cattle respectively.

Kerin said Indonesia was expected to become Australia's biggest market in the region in 1995 with a 20,000-head rise, while sales to the Philippines were forecast to continue at last year's level.

"The increase in trade to both countries has been a spectacular aspect of a very satisfactory general increase in live cattle trade throughout Southeast Asia," he said in a statement.

The growth in exports to the region was contributing significantly to the viability of cattle production in northern Australia, he added.