Fight against WA’s shot-hole borer given $97 million boost with new biosecurity headquarters

On Saturday the war against the critical polyphagous shot-hole borer was stepped up after the state government announced they were launching a new Biosecurity Response Centre to tackle the invasive pest.

The new $97.3 million headquarters located in the Canning Vale industrial area will house biosecurity operations, incident response teams and diagnostics, and laboratory services to manage pest and disease threats to WA.

Agriculture minister Jackie Jarvis launched the new Canning Vale facility on Saturday.Credit: 9 News Perth

More than 6000 trees in metropolitan Perth have been visited by tree loppers since the outbreak in 2021 as the state grapples with the out of control shot-hole borer - one of the most destructive pests to breach Australia’s strict biosecurity controls.

Jarvis said the WA government’s current strategy to eradicate the pest was in line with the rest of Australia.

“We are currently on an eradication plan that may change into the future, but at this stage, we are working on the best advice we have now.” she said.

“It is true that in some individual trees, you can just remove a limb or two and remove the borer. What we know, however, is the borer just moves to the tree next door or another tree. So whilst you can do a lot of work to protect an individual tree, what we need to do is make sure that we work on an eradication plan.

WA’s new biosecurity centre in Canning Vale.Credit: State Government

“If it is no longer technically feasible to eradicate, then we will cross that bridge when it comes to it.”

Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development’s (DPIRD) chief plant biosecurity officer Vincent Lanoiselet said although the quarantine area had been extended, the pest was so far contained.

“We had to extend the quarantine area back in September following detection that we were getting very close to the edges of the quarantine area and on the outer boundaries,” he said.

“That’s why we extended the quarantine area to the whole Perth metropolitan area but at this stage we haven’t detected any borer outside of that quarantine area, which is great news.”

Agriculture minister Jackie Jarvis said the shot-hole borer response team would be one of the first to move into the new centre which will accommodate 200-300 staff when fully operational.

The four-hectare site includes modern office accommodation, 6000sqm of warehousing, a large hardstand area for new modular laboratory buildings and car parking.

The facilities will support the state’s biosecurity functions of surveillance, investigations, diagnostics and response activities.

Jarvis said the biosecurity team were originally going to be based with other scientists at Murdoch University but that it “became clear” that it would not be large enough to deal with the “increasing biosecurity threats that Australia is facing”.

Asbestos closed the department’s South Perth facility in June.