Sponsoring a Butcher in WA: Why the Duties, Not the Setting, Decide the Nomination

Sponsoring a butcher in WA turns on a single occupation. The Core Skills Occupation List has one butchery entry, butcher or smallgoods maker, and unlike the other food trades on the list it carries no exclusion for the setting the work is done in.

That places the weight of the matter on the duties. Neither a retail shop, a supermarket meat department nor a processing plant excludes the occupation, but it applies only to a position whose tasks are genuinely butchery or smallgoods making. For a meat business with process-line roles as well as trade roles, that is the distinction to settle before any position is advertised.

Where the 482 sits among the employer-sponsored pathways

Three employer-sponsored visas are relevant to a butchery position: the subclass 482 Skills in Demand visa, the subclass 186 Employer Nomination Scheme visa and the subclass 494 Skilled Employer Sponsored Regional (Provisional) visa, all three covered on our employer sponsored visas page. The requirements on this page belong to the subclass 482 visa and its nomination in the Core Skills stream. The 186 and 494 pathways carry their own criteria, which are not set out here.

How we approach a sponsorship for a meat business is set out in our guide to engaging an agent for employer sponsorship in Perth.

Source: Migration Regulations 1994, Schedule 2, Parts 186, 482 and 494, compilation F2026C00667, Compilation No. 288, 1 July 2026; Migration Act 1958, section 140GBA, compilation C2026C00232, Compilation No. 171, 4 June 2026.

Sponsoring a butcher in WA starts with one occupation on the list

The Core Skills Occupation List names one butchery occupation:

• Butcher or Smallgoods Maker, ANZSCO 351211

The list also names Meat Inspector, ANZSCO 311312, which is a separate occupation with its own tasks and is not an alternative description of a butchery role.

The list does not name a slaughterer, a boner or a slicer as an occupation of its own. Only the occupations on the list are specified for a Core Skills stream nomination, so a position has to be one of them in substance, not in title.

Source: Migration (Specification of Occupations—Subclass 482 Visa) Instrument 2024 (LIN 24/089), section 6(1) and section 6(3), Core Skills Occupation List items 292 and 385, compilation F2025C01064, Compilation No. 3, 7 November 2025.

No setting excludes a butcher position

Butcher or smallgoods maker carries no applicable circumstance. That is what sets it apart from the other food trades on the list.

• Baker and pastrycook do not apply to a position in mass or standardised production, including a position in a franchise or factory, or one producing food for distribution to another location.
• Chef and cook do not apply to a position involved in mass production in a factory setting, or to a position in a limited service restaurant.
• Butcher or smallgoods maker has no equivalent exclusion.

For a meat business, the practical effect is that producing for distribution, working in a factory setting or serving at a retail counter does not by itself rule the occupation out. A bakery supplying other outlets faces a setting question before it reaches the duties. A butchery or smallgoods operation doing the same does not, and moves straight to the question in the next section.

Source: LIN 24/089, section 6(2), section 7(2) (Applicable Circumstances List, items 3, 4 and 10), and Core Skills Occupation List items 383, 384, 385, 386 and 387, compilation F2025C01064, Compilation No. 3, 7 November 2025.

The butchery tasks must match the work on your floor

An occupation on the list applies to your nominee only if the tasks they will perform in your position correspond to the tasks set out in the ANZSCO code for that occupation. The title on your position description does not decide it. The duties do.

This is where a meat business most often needs a second look. Because no setting excludes the occupation, the whole of the eligibility question for the occupation rests on the tasks, and a processing operation usually has more than one kind of role. A position spent breaking down product into cuts and preparing smallgoods is a different position from one spent at a single station on a line. Whether a line position corresponds to the butcher or smallgoods maker tasks is answered by the ANZSCO description for 351211, and it is worth answering before you advertise rather than after you nominate.

The obligation does not end at nomination. As an approved sponsor you must ensure the sponsored butcher works in the occupation you nominated. A position described as butchery and worked as something else is a compliance problem after the visa is granted, not only a drafting problem before it.

Source: LIN 24/089, section 6(1)(c), compilation F2025C01064, Compilation No. 3, 7 November 2025; Migration Regulations 1994, regulation 2.86 (work in the nominated occupation), compilation F2026C00667, Compilation No. 288, 1 July 2026.

The 482 mandatory skills assessment does not cover butchers

Butcher or smallgoods maker is not one of the occupations for which a mandatory skills assessment is specified for the subclass 482 visa. Baker, pastrycook, chef and cook are, each with Trades Recognition Australia as the assessing authority and a passport list that decides whether the assessment applies.

For a butchery nomination, that requirement does not arise, whichever country issued your candidate's passport. It is a real difference in planning from the other food trades, because a mandatory assessment adds a separate application to the timeline.

The absence of a mandatory assessment is not the same as the absence of any question about the candidate's skills. Whether and how your candidate's skills and experience need to be evidenced in the visa application is a separate matter, which we assess for the individual candidate.

Source: Migration (IMMI 18/039: Mandatory Skills Assessment—Subclass 482 Visa) Instrument 2018, section 5(2), table items 2, 6, 7 and 20, compilation F2025C00062, Compilation No. 2, 14 December 2024.

Advertise before you nominate

A butchery position has to be tested in the Australian labour market before it is nominated. The advertising must fall within the four months ending on the day the nomination is lodged. Because each advertisement must show the title or a description of the position, write it for the butchery position you intend to nominate. Our labour market testing page covers the advertising requirements in more detail.

Source: Migration (LIN 18/036: Period, manner and evidence of labour market testing) Instrument 2018, sections 6(1), 7(1) and 8(2)–(7), compilation F2024C01268, Compilation No. 5, 7 December 2024.

Once the butcher starts work

Your obligations as a sponsor continue for as long as the sponsorship does. The one that matters most in a meat business is that the butcher must work in the occupation you nominated. Moving a sponsored butcher onto a line to cover a shortage is exactly the kind of change that has to be considered before it happens, not after. A failure to satisfy a sponsorship obligation can lead to administrative action against your business, including cancellation of your approval as a sponsor or a bar on future sponsorship, and to a civil penalty. Our standard business sponsor page sets out the wider obligations.

Source: Migration Regulations 1994, Division 2.19, regulation 2.86, compilation F2026C00667, Compilation No. 288, 1 July 2026; Migration Act 1958, sections 140K, 140M and 140Q, compilation C2026C00232, Compilation No. 171, 4 June 2026.

What we would ask at the outset

We settle which of your positions are butchery in substance before anything else, because the nomination, the advertising content and the sponsorship obligations all depend on it. That means starting with these questions:

• What does the butcher actually do in a normal week: breaking down product into cuts, preparing smallgoods, serving at a counter, working a station on a line, or a combination?
• Is the work done in a retail shop, a supermarket meat department, a wholesale operation or a processing plant?
• Are you looking to fill trade roles, process-line roles, or both?
• Is the candidate already in Australia on a 482 or 457 visa, and if so, in what occupation?
• Has the position already been advertised, and if so, when, where and under what title?
• Is the site in regional WA, in case a 494 nomination is worth considering alongside a 482?

Questions WA meat businesses commonly ask

Speak with a registered migration agent

We cannot tell you in advance whether a particular nomination will be approved, and no registered agent can. What we can do is settle which positions fall within the occupation, and the advertising timeline, before your business commits to either.

This page reflects the law as at 30 September 2026. It is general information, not advice about your circumstances.