Remaining vigilant in the face of African swine fever

An industry expert has warned the Federal Government to remain vigilant and continue the fight against the virus.

The Federal Government has issued a series of written warnings as part of efforts to stop African swine fever from entering Australia.

MORE than 1700 travellers entering Australia were intercepted with pork products between March and June this year as efforts continue to prevent an outbreak of African swine fever.

But one industry expert has warned the Federal Government to remain vigilant and continue the fight against the virus.

Between March and June this year, only one test for the virus was conducted, with the test coming back negative.

According to the Department of Agriculture, about 89 per cent of travellers with pork products declared it.

More than 50 infringement notices and 90 written warnings were issued between March and June this year.

Victorian Farmers Federation pig group president Tim Kingma said while international traffic was stalled due to coronavirus, the Federal Government should focus on beefing up biosecurity.

“Now is the best time to have the best systems in place,” Mr Kingma said.

“It’s a really good start, with increased testing, increased penalties, and a flow-on effect of people declaring their goods, which is what we want.

“But I believe COVID-19 makes the data a bit skewed … while we have very limited movement, it’s always in peace time you have to improve your systems.”

Mr Kingma suggested increased number of sniffer dogs at ports would help increase detection of pork products entering the country.

“Every port that has people coming in has sniffer dogs working. Increasing our X-ray surveillance is good too. I understand there are two very good machines at Sydney and Melbourne, but let’s keep developing on that.

“If there’s one thing COVID-19 has shown us, is that biosecurity is paramount.”

African swine fever would be devastating for Australia’s 2700 pork producers.

The Federal Government has measures in place to prevent the spread of the virus, including taking action to reduce the risk of ASF entering the country via Torres Strait into northern Australia.

The Government released its $66.6 million ASF biosecurity response package last year.

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