Barnaby Joyce slams supermarket shoppers for hoarding food after low stock levels hit Queensland

The Deputy Prime Minister has hit out at hoarders raiding the supermarket shelves as flooding affects produce availability.

The Deputy Prime Minister has slammed Mackay residents for gluttonous behaviour in the checkout lines of local supermarkets, as he declares the country will not run out of food.

Barnaby Joyce, during a visit to the sugar city, criticised the empty shelves across the state and said residents were taking more than what was required.

“Australia is not running out of food,” he said.

“We might run out of toilet paper, but we’re not going to run out of food.

“We are the biggest, one of the biggest, beef producers in the world, one of the biggest sheep meat producers in the world … one of the biggest food exporters in the world.

Flooding across a railway in Queensland’s south forced Woolworths to re-route deliveries to its North Queensland stores, which were already experiencing supply chain disruptions because of Covid.

Purchasing limitations were introduced across major supermarkets in Queensland because of the limited supply, and Mr Joyce has urged people to follow the rules.

“Stop hoarding food, the only thing that’s causing this problem is people hoarding, we’re growing tomatoes, we’ll never run out of them,” he said.

“We’ll keep those trucks moving, keep those shelves stacked.

“Please, buy what you need, not more than what’s required, because when you swipe all the RAT tests off the shelf, someone misses out.

“Take what’s required, and we can make this an orderly process.”

A Woolworths spokesman said teams were working hard to ensure stock was delivered as soon as possible but customers would find stores with reduced stock availability.

“We’ve re-routed our deliveries via road and expect to have trucks arriving at stores across the region over the next 24-48 hours,” the spokesman said.

“We know this is frustrating and thank our customers for their patience.

“Our thoughts are with all communities who have been affected by flooding across Queensland.”

It is understood meat and poultry are some of the products most affected.

In an email to Woolworths’ customers on Thursday, CEO Brad Banducci explained the variety of stock would continue to be reduced as the supply chain dealt with a number of workers who were in isolation because of Covid-19.

“In the meantime, we have more than enough stock in the system and plenty more coming,” Mr Banducci said.

“We also have good supply within each ‘category’ of product — so it really helps if you can be flexible with the choices you make.”

Coles stores in Mackay were experiencing similar difficulties, with many of the Sydney Street Market shelves near barren on Saturday, and Rural View Coles not faring much better.

A Coles spokeswoman said the company had been dealing with a number of supply chain issues, including “a shortage of shipping pallets and a reduction in transport capacity”.

“More recently, an increase in Covid case numbers in the community has required more people to isolate, which has meant fewer people are available to work, including in the food manufacturing and transport sectors,” the spokeswoman said.

“This has led to disruptions in deliveries from our suppliers, which in turn has resulted in product outages across all departments in our stores.

“We expect it will be several weeks before we are able to fully recover.”

Coles has introduced temporary purchase limits for all Coles supermarkets, Coles Online and Coles Express stores in all states and territories, except WA for the following items:

– Mince – 2 packs

– Chicken breast – 2 packs, or 6 fillets from the deli

– Chicken thigh – 2 packs, or 6 fillets from the deli

– Sausages – 2 packs

– The one-pack limit on Rapid Antigen Tests continues to apply.

“We apologise to our customers if an item they wish to purchase is unavailable when they do their shopping, and ask that they continue to treat our team with kindness and respect, and purchase only what they need,” the spokeswoman said.