Full steam ahead!
Regular readers may recall the image of aquatic tranquillity that decorated my most recent entry in the log of The Leaflet. The subsequent period has been anything but tranquil. As I write (in my heaving cabin) the crew leading the bid to establish the Plant Biosecurity CRC is driving at full speed towards a rendezvous with the CRC Committee on 10 November. It’s very pleasing to record the efforts of all the Able Sea-persons aboard the CRCNPB who have been solidly behind this activity, not least those who work from ports remote from our harbour in Canberra. Thank you all, and we look forward to a safe landfall and delivering the goods on your behalf.
The image also reminds us of the essential driver for both CRCNPB and, hopefully, its successor. Travel, trade and tourism are significant elements in exposing Australia to biosecurity risk. Recent data show, for example, that the number of international travellers arriving at Sydney Airport in 2010 will exceed 12 million. When the CRCNPB began in 2005 the figure was less than 10 million; if the PBCRC bid is successful and an eight year term is completed in 2019 the number of travellers will have reached almost 20 million (30 million is predicted by 2029), and this is through one Australian entry point alone. Every traveller represents a biosecurity risk and one that must be managed more effectively as the numbers grow.
None of the foregoing is particularly new but it has added force at the present time when Australia is dealing with two significant incursions. The first, Myrtle Rust (Uredo rangelii), was detected on the Central Coast of New South Wales in April this year. This pathogen is a threat to the horticultural industry via its impact in nurseries. In addition, native Myrtaceae - eucalypts, bottle brushes, tea trees and other valued indigenous flora - are all at risk, so that there is a significant ‘amenity’ or community aspect to this particular incursion. It emphasises why it is so important that community awareness be enhanced to support the efforts of industry and government when incursions occur. This is a significant thrust in the PBCRC bid.
The Myrtle Rust example is also an excellent illustration of concerns identified by the United Nations in documentation for 2010, the International Year of Biodiversity. The UN statement “…invasive alien species can have devastating impacts…affecting natural and cultivated ecosystems” exactly fits the challenge presented by Myrtle Rust. And the link between biosecurity and biodiversity, to which I have alluded in previous columns is, once more, apparent.
The second incursion was documented as recently as September, when chestnut blight (Cryphonectria parasitica) was detected in two chestnut groves in north east Victoria. Following a meeting with industry Bill Sykes, Federal Member for Benalla, said "The concern is the impact on production and the cost of eradicating and who pays for that cost and if the disease isn't eradicated the cost of living with the disease." A very succinct assessment of the impact of a pest incursion and echoes of October 2004 when half a million citrus trees in Central Queensland were destroyed in the interest of protecting the Australian citrus industry at large.
These two examples are a reminder that when we think in terms of Australia’s grains industry or horticultural industry we are actually dealing with a plethora of crops with their attendant suites of insect pests and pathogens. Myrtle Rust and Chestnut Blight may not rate with, for example, Russian wheat aphid as pests we’d rather not have, but for the industries and communities concerned they are no less significant.
Time to put the quill down, leave the arm of the chair and head for the hammock.
