Submission to the Standing Committee on Legislation Inquiry into the Firearms Act 2024 (WA)

Australia’s red meat industry has reacted with fury to the Australia-EU Free Trade Agreement signed on 24 March 2026. Peak bodies across the sector called it a missed generational opportunity, with Cattle Australia branding the result “appalling” and the Australian Lot Feeders Association describing it as a failing grade.

The numbers tell the story. Australia secured 30,600 tonnes of beef access in carcase weight terms, but only 10,200 tonnes will be available for the first five years. The industry had identified 50,000 tonnes as the minimum required to match what the EU has offered competing nations. On sheepmeat and goatmeat, Australia received 25,000 tonnes against an industry benchmark of 67,000 tonnes. New Zealand, by comparison, holds EU access for over 163,000 tonnes of sheepmeat.

Grainfed beef producers face a further blow. Under the existing 481 quota system, grainfed beef entered the EU tariff-free. The new agreement introduces a 7.5% tariff on grainfed volumes, a significant backwards step for that sector. The deal arrives at a particularly difficult moment: the red meat industry is already contending with billion-dollar losses to China’s beef safeguard tariffs, severe Indonesian import restrictions, and proposed 38% increases to federal export cost recovery charges.

Industry groups including AMIC, ALFA, Cattle Australia, the NFF and AgForce have called on the government to pause its cost recovery fee increases given the poor trade outcome, and to review how market access functions are funded. The National Farmers Federation warned farmers will pay the price for this outcome for decades.