Truckwash shortage exposes livestock biosecurity risk

Saleyard closures are exacerbating a shortage of truck washes, putting livestock biosecurity at risk.

Farmers are calling for truck washes to be built close to Melbourne, to plug a gap in the state’s ability to protect livestock and respond to biosecurity threats.

A lack of truck washes around Melbourne has exposed a gaping hole in Victoria’s biosecurity safety net, with calls to use some of the $57.4 million the government has squirrelled away in livestock compensation funds to remedy the problem.

A 2023 RMCG view of Victoria’s truck wash and effluent disposal found “a substantial gap in the coverage of truck wash facilities both west and north of Melbourne, given 85 per cent of pigs, 40 per cent of cattle and 30 per cent of sheep were processed within its suburbs.

Yet the recent closure of the Pakenham saleyards and its truck wash, mean livestock and grain producers must wait until they reach Geelong, Kyneton, Colac or Ballarat to clean out their vehicles.

Livestock & Rural Transporters Association past president John Beer said using the livestock compensation funds to help build truck washes around Melbourne was “a no-brainer”.

The compensation funds have grown from $28 million in 2019 to $57.4m, as of June 30 this year, with farmers pouring almost twice as much in livestock transactions into the account as was being paid out to support industry biosecurity.

But Victorian Farmers Federation livestock president Scott Young was more cautious on dipping into the compensation funds to build truck washes.

“We can look at the avenues we’ve got,” Mr Young said. “Perhaps that might be the compensation funds.”

He said truck washes were a vital part of keeping the livestock industry safe and detecting any potential threats.

“In the event of an emergency animal disease, the need for an efficient and effective truck wash network would be central to a statewide response,” Mr Young said.

When foot and mouth disease hit the UK in 2001, a shortage of truck washes forced major delays, forcing drivers to wash vehicles by hand.

Former VFF livestock group president Leonard Vallance said he would rather see the compensation funds used as an incentive to get private sector investment in truck washes, perhaps as part of service centres, ideally on Melbourne’s major arterial roads – the Geelong, Calder, Hume and Gippsland highways.

But he said the Victorian government should not get its hands on the compensation funds, as “no-one trusts them to build anything at a reasonable cost”: “They’d spend $3 million just scoping it.”