Friday, March 29, 2024

Call for stock stop rehearsals from WAFarmers

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Trevor Whittington, CEO, WAFarmers, CEO Update, 30 May 2022

Indonesia has 280 million people of which 38 million are farmers. Between them have 16 million cattle and 9 million pigs spread across 6000 inhabited islands, extending 5,500km East to West and 1,800km North to South.

Perth airport
Perth Airport.

As the borders open and the world starts travelling again, we can look forward to the return of the 50 flights a week between Bali and Perth.  Each of these flights will carry the risk of the transmission of Lumpy Skin and Foot and Mouth Disease into Australia.

It has been nearly 10 years since the Department of Agriculture has run a Stock Stop rehearsal in preparation for a biosecurity outbreak such as the ones on our Indonesian doorstep and the recent state budget has seen biosecurity funding lift by just $1m from $95m for 2022 to $96m in four years’ time when inflation has just hit 6%.

WAFarmers will be suggesting to the State government that given the devasting consequences of a F and M or LSD outbreak to WA agriculture, as a bare minimum we need funding to reflect the rise in the rate of inflation and for Stock Stop rehearsals to occur every 3 years. If we have learnt nothing from COVID going hard and fast in a lockdown is the only way to contain an outbreak.   

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