SA’s plans to fly in Pacific Island seasonal workers on hold as state eyes alternative quarantine models

SA’s plans to fly in workers from the Pacific Islands to fill critical fruit-picking jobs are on ice until the State Government finds a new quarantine model.

Flights to bring seasonal workers from the Pacific Islands into South Australia are on ice until the State Government identifies new quarantine arrangements.

The Marshall Government has paused flights to bring any further overseas workers into SA until it can identify alternative quarantine arrangements, as it says the medi-hotels do not have sufficient capacity.

SA’s citrus growers say they desperately need Pacific Island workers by April when the harvest begins, which means flights will need to restart as soon as possible in coming weeks.

Farmers have been struggling to find Australians to take on fruit-picking jobs while borders are closed across the country, and have lost millions of dollars worth of crops due to labour shortages.

Citrus grower Mark Doecke has spoken out previously about the dire need for workers to fill fruit-picking jobs ahead of this year’s harvest. Picture: James Elsby

To date, just one flight with 98 seasonal workers has arrived in South Australia. Those workers did their 14 days of quarantine in medi-hotels.

Queensland, which uses “on farm” quarantine as an alternative option to hotel quarantine, has flown in 782 workers.

Federal Agriculture Department figures show more than 620 seasonal workers from the Pacific Islands have arrived in Tasmania, 314 in Western Australian, 323 in the Northern Territory and 354 in New South Wales during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Citrus SA chair Mark Doecke said: “Our ultimate [preference] would still be a travel bubble, but if they’re looking at other options other than medi-hotels in the city, that’s good.”

Mr Doecke has previously called for the Federal Government to open a travel bubble with the Pacific Islands, so seasonal workers could travel freely to Australia without the need to quarantine.  

He said halting flights for a week or two would be fine if the State Government launched new arrangements that allowed a larger number of workers to fly in more quickly.

‘On farm’ quarantine or a regional facility would work, but the preference would be for ‘on farm’ quarantine so people could work immediately, he said.

Flights would need to restart in March as the harvest would ramp up over the six weeks from April to mid-May and would then be “flat out,” Mr Doecke said.

Primary Industries Minister David Basham said the Federal Government schemes to bring in seasonal workers from the Pacific were “vital” to fill farm worker shortages.

“At present there are no medi-hotel quarantine places available in South Australia, with the state’s capacity dedicated to returning Australians,” he said.

“The State Government is working urgently to identify alternative quarantine arrangements.”

Federal Agriculture Minister David Littleproud said he would encourage SA to “look at additional options for supporting the arrival of workers before the peak harvest period.”

“SA, NSW, Victoria, Tasmania and WA should be looking at the option of adopting on-farm quarantine arrangements, like Queensland and the NT, where they are facing hotel quarantine constraints,” he said.

It’s understood there had been planning underway for four flights to bring workers into SA over February and March.

Plans to bring seasonal workers from the Pacific Islands into South Australia are on ice until the State Government identifies new quarantine arrangements. Picture: News Corp

Under Queensland’s quarantine model, Pacific Island seasonal workers are able to work on regional farms while they quarantine at the location.

They must travel directly from a “low risk” country either on a charter flight, or on a flight that only passengers also from the low risk country have boarded.

The Advertiser understands three flights will bring seasonal workers into Victoria and Tasmania over March, and further flights will go to Queensland, the NT, NSW and WA.