Victorian lockdown causes agriculture event cancellations

Victoria’s five-day coronavirus lockdown has been extended by a week — causing a number of agricultural events to be cancelled.

Premier Daniel Andrews announced a seven-day extension on the lockdown in Victoria, as the state continues to record new community Covid-19 cases. Picture: Daniel Pockett/Getty Images)

Two dairy conferences have been wiped from this year’s calendar following the latest round of pandemic-related restrictions across Australia.

Organisers of the United Dairyfarmers of Victoria annual conference decided late last week to call off this year’s event, after its rescheduled date was thrown into doubt due to a coronavirus outbreak sweeping multiple states.

UDV president Paul Mumford said the conference was originally scheduled for May but was thrown off course by Victoria’s fourth lockdown.

The revised date — this Friday — also was ditched, with a fifth lockdown coming into effect last week.

“Unfortunately, it’s very hard for any conferences to be held at the moment given the situation with Covid-19,” Mr Mumford said.

“Instead of revising the date another time, we thought it would be best to call off the conference for 2021 and instead plan ahead for 2022.

“It was a tough call but there didn’t seem much point in providing another date with the risk of having to cancel again.”

The results of the UDV’s vice presidential election went ahead online on the day originally set for the conference.

Colac region farmer Mark Billing was confirmed as Mr Mumford’s deputy in May.

However, the conference was set to publicly air a number of resolutions for membership debate.

Also cancelled due to neighbouring Victoria’s lockdown is the DairySA Innovation Day, which was scheduled for July 21.

The South Australian event was originally to be held in Mount Gambier on June 9 and was then rescheduled to July 21 but, like the UDV conference, has been cancelled for this year. Organisers will now plan for next year. “The DairySA team have not made this decision lightly but have done so with consideration for the majority of our speakers and many of our sponsors located in Victoria,” organisers wrote on social media last week.

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