The confirmation that Fletcher International Exports was “not under pressure” came after the close of two more abattoirs in Queensland this week.

The perfect storm of a high Australian dollar, weak export markets and ravaged livestock numbers is pushing the meat processing industry toward a survival of the fittest contest. Mr Fletcher said his company was in good stead to see it through.

“We made the decisions to counter the downturn. We decided to drop some numbers on the slaughter floor, we are here for the long haul.

“We have no issues here at all ... everything is running smoothly,” he said.

For other abattoirs however, closure is par for the course.

This week Queensland-based Leitch Pastoral Group stood workers down at two of its abattoirs with the company to signal its future to 230 anxious meatworkers tomorrow in a meeting.

And last week 300 workers were sacked when Young’s Burrangong Meat Processors shut its doors permanently.

Both companies cite the same reasons for the closures - namely low livestock numbers - and reports coming from Young reveal a devastated township. That is not to say Dubbo has gone unscathed.

Fletcher’s has let go of up to 300 casual workers and a brief industrial dispute ended with a hearing before Fair Work Australia.

The meatworkers union and the company settled their differences last month and the plant is continuing to operate five days a week while permanent staff work four days on, three days off.

“If you are not the best in your class, you go broke, this is a very competitive industry,” Mr Fletcher said.

“In twenty years we’ve never closed, the plant has always operated and we can’t see how this is going to change.”

Mr Fletcher said it was “purely about lack of (livestock) numbers” and farmers were retaining livestock in order to rebuild their flocks.

If you don’t have the numbers, Mr Fletcher said, you can’t kill the sheep.

The Australasian Meat Industry Employees Union, which has long called for a ban on live sheep exports, said governments needed to recognise there was problems in the industry.

“Both State and Federal governments need to look at how they can assist processors,” the union’s federal secretary, Brian Crawford, said.

The Oppposition’s agriculture spokesperson John Cobb said governments should tread lightly when it came to the volatile meat processing industry.

“Margins in beef and sheep industries are extremely tight and any moves by the Government, State or Federal, to increase overheads on abattoirs will have, and is having, a major effect on the viability and profitability of processors,” he said.

The lack of investment in NSW, which saw Fletcher’s build its own train station the spokesperson said, was a major worry for abattoirs.

So far the Federal Government seems to have gone to ground on the issue.

The Daily Liberal contacted the office of agriculture minister, Tony Burke, and was told the matter was being handled by Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, because it was an “employment issue” not an industry issue.

Ms Gillard’s office then advised the Daily Liberal to contact the Minister for Employment Participation, Mark Arbib.

A spokesperson for Senator Arbib referred the matter back to minister Burke.

At the time of going to print the Daily Liberal had not been contacted by any minister.