Brooklyn

Other Names

Current Operation

  • Operational as at 13.11.2013
  • Establishment #06882
  • Export accredited abattoir processing Beef, Sheep, Goat and Offal.2

Location   

  • Brooklyn is located 14km from Melbourne’s CBD1

Hema Maps – Australia Truckies atlas.

Owner

Operation   

  • Establishment #6881
  • Beef – grass and grain fed1
  • lamb, hogget, mutton & veal1
  • Employees – 6881
  • Processes 5,200 daily1
  • Largest multis species processing facility in southern hemisphere1

History

2001

  • June. Fire had gutted the plant3

2002

  • March. SBA foods sell to Tasman Group Services, new trading name Belandra Pty Ltd.3
    • Brooklyn export abattoir operated in conjunction with Westgate coolstores
    • $25M deal included purchase with Longord abattoir (Tas) and King Island abattoir (Tas) mothballed Altona meatworks in Melbourne west and 8,000 head Yambinya feedlot at Wakool near Deniliquin NSW.3
  • Brooklyn facility still in reasonable condition, efforts to re-open had failed but SBA has spent $10M on the beef slaughter chain, chiller and boning facilities in the past 4 years.3

2005

  • June. Trade halted on export of meat to Malaysia over doubts concerning halal status of Australian meat6

2006

  • January. Market access to Malaysia suspended7
    • Malaysians concerned that pneumatic stunning and use of the thoracic stick (Used to speed up bleeding of carcase) were being used to speed killing process.7
  • April. Brooklyn receives Halal approval from Malaysian Islamic Development department.6
    • AQIS allow milder level of eclectrical stunning and thoracic stick at least 2 minutes after slaughter7
    • Grantham abattoir (QLD) and Wodonga abattoir (Vic) also gained approval7
    • Kilcoy abattoir (QLD), Longford abattoir (Tas) failed the accreditation tests.7

2008

2010

  • December. JBS Swift locked out cold storage workers under the Labor workplace relations regulations.4
    • Workers had rejected a proposed new enterprise agreement4
    • JBS offered wage adjustment 2% a year over 2 years4
    • Shifts increase from 8 hrs to between 9.5-12.6hrs affecting workers overtime and weekend penalty rates4
    • Union claim its a real wage cut given rate of inflation
    • Mostly immigrant workers striking granted a one-of payment of $250 and not normal wage on strike time, payable when picket disbanded.4
    • Union shut down picket on December 22 to revive on January 44
  • Work had continued at the plant with workers flown in from QLD and others sourced from a labour hire agency4

2012

  • JBS Australia split into two operating entities to make Northern and Southern regions in relation to abattoirs and feedlots within those areas8.
    • South – Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania8
    • North – NSW and QLD.8

2013

  • February. Received carbon abatement grant $212,512 towards equipment replacement worth $425,0005
    • replace boiler network with a higher efficency boiler and heat exchanger.5
    • Expect to reduce carbon emissions by 35%, saving $60,000 in energy costs per year5

2014

 

  • July. JBS Australia across all facilities in operation kills daily8
    • 8,500 cattle,8
    • 24,000 smalls – which includes lambs8
    • Employs more than 8,000 people8

 

Sources

  1. ‘Our Plants – Brooklyn’ http://www.jbsswift.com.au Accessed 13.11.2013
  2. Aus meat List 28.02.2014
  3. ‘SBA foods sells to Tasman groups services’ Stock and Land. 19.03.2002
  4. ‘Australia: Union shuts down picket of locked out meatworkers’ http://www.wsws.org 28.12.10
  5. ‘Teys, T & R in latest round of carbon abatement grants’ Beef Central 18.02.13
  6. Headlines for week ending 21.04.06 http://www.profarmer.com.au.
  7. ‘Abattoirs supply Malaysia again’ Farm Weekly, 19.04.2006
  8. ‘The next Swift shift’ The Weekly Times. 30.07.2014

Tagged: , , , , , , , ,

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

%d bloggers like this: