Livestock & animals

The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development supply chain support, research and development and rigorous biosecurity systems underpin the economic success of Western Australia’s livestock industries. In 2011/12, the WA livestock industries contributed 26% of the state’s agriculture, fisheries and forestry production, worth approximately $2 billion at the farm gate.

WA is a world leader in live exports, super fine wool production and dryland sheep and grain systems. Both cattle and sheep systems are focused on export markets to Asia and the Middle East. WA also has innovative, world-class integrated dairy and pork industries meeting local and South East Asian demand for safe, fresh milk and pork. The WA poultry industry is growing strongly as a result of increasing domestic consumption.

Global demand for high-quality, safe animal protein and products produced according to high animal welfare standards will continue to rise in coming years. Increasingly DAFWA will partner with industry -- locally, nationally and internationally -- in transformational business projects to capitalise on this demand.

Articles

  • Gastro-intestinal worm infections in sheep are a major cause of lost productivity to the Western Australian (WA) sheep industry and control has become more complex due to widespread drench resistan

  • Treatment of ewes and lambs is more complex than treatment of a mob of single animals because they exist as a unit of two or three animals in close contact rather than individuals within in a mob.

  • The sheep industry relies heavily on drench chemicals to control sheep worms but in Western Australia (WA) worms have become increasingly resistant to drenches.

  • Hydatid disease is a serious human health concern, caused by cysts of the tapeworm parasite Echinococcus granulosus.

  • Lost productivity due to drench resistance in sheep worms has been recognised as a widespread problem in Western Australia (WA) since the 1980s.