Live export: Chris Rodwell appointed as Albanese Government’s sheep shipping ban ‘transition advocate’

The Albanese Government has finally appointed a “transition advocate” for its live export ban, with a Perth-based senior CSIRO staffer named the successful candidate eight months after the $1600-a-day role was announced. Chris Rodwell will take on the controversial role, described as a “poisoned chalice” and Australia’s “most unpopular job” by industry leaders and the Opposition. He will be responsible for facilitating “two-way communication between industry and government”, and providing information to the sheep industry about available government support, Labor says. He will also assist in an industry stocktake scheduled for 2026 and 2027 to assess the WA sheep industry’s preparedness for the ban, set to take effect in mid-2028. “Dr Chris Rodwell’s role will be important in achieving a successful transition to the end of the trade,” Federal Agriculture Minister Julie Collins said in a statement. “(He) will play a critical role linking stakeholders, producers and the supply chain to government.” Dr Rodwell was most recently a group leader and program manager at the CSIRO’s Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness. He previously held senior roles at WA’s Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, and at New Zealand’s Ministry for Primary Industries. As transition advocate, Dr Rodwell will work up to 80 days a year until June 2029, when the contract ends, and be paid between $1200 and $1600 a day. His salary is being sourced from the Albanese Government’s $139.7 million “transition package”, intended to help the sheep industry adapt to the ban. Federal Nationals leader David Littleproud described the transition advocate’s role as “Australia’s highest-paying, least-wanted position”. Applications closed on December 16, but the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry would not reveal how many were received when asked by Countryman. Mr Littleproud said the position had proved “difficult to fill” because the ban was so unpopular among farmers. “Farmers don’t want an advocate or handouts, they just want to keep their industry,” he said. “Everything about this process is wrong.” Mr Littleproud reaffirmed his promise to overturn the ban if the Coalition won this year’s Federal election. “If elected, my first role as agriculture minister will be to travel to the Middle East and build those important trade relationships again, to reinstate the live sheep export trade,” he said. WA Nationals Senate candidate Paul Brown said the industry refused to “give the idea of a transition advocate any credence”. “Most of the funding is going towards the bureaucracy and paying for his (Dr Rodwell’s) expensive salary, not delivering to industry,” Mr Brown said. The creation of an advocate was one of 28 recommendations made by an independent panel commissioned by the Federal Government in 2023 to advise on how best to implement the live sheep export ban. The panel also advised early action from the Government, and pegged farming business planning, market opportunities, and processing and cold storage infrastructure as the most important areas to address in the first half of 2024. The panel said early action would provide sheep producers with confidence in the industry’s ability to pivot to a boxed meat trade within four years. Australian Livestock Exporters’ Council chief executive Mark Harvey-Sutton previously said employing an advocate would do nothing to help those affected by the ban. “People . . . are already experiencing a downturn as a result of the loss of confidence this ban has created,” he said last month. “It ought to be scrapped, and whoever takes it should understand that it is a poisoned chalice.”