Nursery owner Peter Petsios fumes after biosecurity change for contagious tomato virus

Months after a contagious virus decimated SA’s tomato industry, the national biosecurity watchdog has relaxed regulations – sparking an furious response from a devastated producer.

An SA tomato nursery owner is demanding an inquiry and threatening legal action after the nation’s biosecurity watchdog backflipped on strict virus regulations that crippled the industry.

A federal committee this week ruled it was no longer feasible to eradicate tomato brown rugose fruit virus from Australia – a decision SA tomato growers have been demanding for months.

The discovery of the virus in South Australia, also known as ToBRFV, in July last year threw the industry into meltdown, costing millions of dollars and dozens of jobs.

SA Tomato owner Peter Petsios said he had lost about $4m, his physical health and mental health had nosedived and his 65-year-old family business had been closed for nine months.

“This has taken a toll on me,” Mr Petsios said. “This is the worst thing that’s happened to me – it’s like a death in the family or something.

Peter and Oriana Petsios outside SA Tomato in Virginia. Picture: Matt Loxton

“How the hell am I going to come up with $4m? How am I ever going to recover from this?

“I’m gonna have to work right around the clock for the rest of my life to pay this debt off, so we’re going to go after them.”

Mr Petsios said he and other growers had told biosecurity officials from the start that Australia needed a strategy of management, rather than eradication, for ToBRFV – similar to that in other countries.

He said he was relieved by the belated change of regulations but it was impossible to celebrate considering the pain and suffering he had endured.

“It’s like after a war and you’ve lost your loved one – you’re not out in the street cheering, you’ve still lost your child,” he said.

“I want answers. Whose fault is this? I could have had a heart attack. I could have been dead – I’ve been to the doctor lots of times. My chest hurts, I’ve got a permanent headache, vision loss, things like that. Just enormous grief. Enormous anxiety.

“Common sense has finally prevailed, and now it’s about whose fault this was. Who did this? We want answers now. This should have been a one-week issue. This is an embarrassing, terrible mistake.”

Annette Pulbrook inside a greenhouse at Perfection Fresh in November last year. Picture: Brett Hartwig

A Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry’s national biosecurity management group announced the change from eradication to management of ToBRFV on Thursday.

Detection of the virus forced SA Tomato, fellow northern suburbs tomato growers Gawler River Tomatoes and Perfection Fresh and Victorian-based Katunga Fresh into quarantine.

The switch from eradication to management came after a new batch of infected seedlings at Katunga Fresh were found to have originated from a commercial nursery in NSW – a state with no previous link to the virus.

Perfection Fresh chief executive Michael Simonetta said the decision brought much-needed certainty to growers and aligned Australia with international best practice.

“Australia’s initial response was based on the unrealistic assumption that ToBRFV could be permanently excluded,” he said.

Perfection Fresh general manager Mathew Fergusson throws tomatoes into a skip after the company’s Two Wells farm was placed in quarantine last year. Picture: Brett Hartwig

“This has come at significant cost to industry, without a proportionate benefit.”

State primary industries minister Clare Scriven said if SA had not complied with national eradication protocols, more than 200 growers would have been blocked from exporting into other states.

“South Australia exports 90 per cent of our tomatoes and therefore the approach of what every other state takes is important,” she said.

Ms Scriven said SA Tomato had already received some compensation and was eligible for more once they submitted a formal request for reimbursement.

State opposition primary industries spokeswoman Nicola Centofanti said early transparency and consistent national policy dealing with the virus would have saved many producers from “devastating losses”.

“This revision is what growers have been calling on for months now, but their advice has fallen on deaf ears.

“What we saw under (Primary Industries Minister) Clare Scriven’s watch was a biosecurity response that was reactive rather than proactive. The cost of that failure has fallen squarely on the shoulders of SA growers.”