Fruit ready to roll from state’s northern farms after all-clear on fruit fly

Tasmanian fruit growers are celebrating, with the state declared free of fruit fly.

R.W. Squibb and Sons managing director Brett Squibb is looking forward to a return to normality. Picture: CHRIS KIDD

Tasmanian fruit growers are celebrating, with the state declared free of fruit fly.

Farmers across the state had been counting down to Wednesday’s critical deadline when Tasmania had its Pest Free Area status reinstated.

Restrictions on selling fruit from the northern control zones, including fumigation requirements, have now been lifted.

Growers in the control zones are now free to trade and move fruit within the state and to the mainland.

Work can also get under way to restore access for fruit from those areas to overseas export markets.

FRUIT FLY-FREE STATUS BACK ON TRACK

Fruit Growers Tasmania CEO Stuart Burgess said the reintroduction of the PFA status, almost 12 months after the Queensland fruit fly incursion, was an important step for the industry.

“It is an extraordinarily good day, a positive day and a day we can say that we’ve done it together,” he said.

“One of the things we are always aware of though is you don’t rest on your laurels. We’re not complacent.”

While the overall cost to the industry is not yet known, Mr Burgess said the financial impact on some individual businesses had been significant.

The focus will now be on restoring access for fruit within the control zone to export markets, which has to be negotiated with individual importing countries depending on their quarantine requirements.

Mr Burgess said he was hopeful these markets would be opened up again before the state’s main apple season begins in late summer.

Spreyton apple growers, the Squibb family, were some of the producers celebrating the milestone.

“It has been a long year and we’re really looking forward to getting back to some normality,” Brett Squibb said.

“I just hope that in another 12 months we can look back and say we got through it and we’ll never have to do that again.”