Virus-hit tomato growers can start replanting
The chief executive of the Department of Primary Industries and Regions says the state’s largest tomato producer can start growing produce again to be tested, in the wake of being shut down and quarantined by a devastating tomato virus.
Perfection Fresh north of Adelaide was shut down by the state government in September alongside two other producers following the outbreak of a highly contagious tomato virus.
There had been little indication of how long strict quarantine for Tomato Brown Rugose Fruit Virus (ToBRFV) would be maintained, but a PIRSA biosecurity official was reported as saying on October 30 that it would likely be months.
Appearing before parliament’s Budget and Finance Committee on Monday, PIRSA chief executive Mehdi Doroudi said Perfection Fresh could begin growing again now.
Asked by Independent MLC Frank Pangallo whether Perfection Fresh “can go back into business”, Doroudi said “yes”.
“They can start growing now and selling into the marketplace?” Pangallo asked.
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“Yes, and we take samples. If samples become negative, we don’t have an issue. If samples become positive, we have an issue and we need to work with that,” Doroudi said.
Before Doroudi’s comments, PIRSA’s Director of Plant and Invasive Species Biosecurity, Nick Secomb, said it would likely “take several months before we can actually prove freedom and say that this disease has been eradicated”.
“Overall, 12 months usually is the period of time, with most pathogens that we get, that you need to continue your testing and you need to continue coming back with negative results until the international community accepts that you are free of the disease,” he said.
In a later statement to InDaily, a PIRSA spokesperson said quarantined properties’ return to trade arrangements would be subject to a national response plan, which is yet to be finalised.
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“The agreed national response plan will clearly spell out the process that businesses will need to undertake to return to trade, without spreading the disease,” they said.
Doroudi told Indaily today that said once the response plan was nationally agreed – which he hoped would be on Friday – Perfection Fresh would not “need to wait for 12 months” to re-enter production.
“If this plan is approved, we can complete the disinfection and disposal of those infected glass houses in Perfection Fresh, and then we can work with them to start replanting,” he said.
“We can bring them, after proper disinfection and disposal of those glasshouses, back to production, but we need to have surveillance and continued testing.
“We can’t make decisions unilaterally, it has to be nationally agreed, and to agree something at a national level, it will take time and it will take processes.”
The PIRSA spokesperson said quarantine arrangements would “continue throughout the duration of the response until eradication can be confirmed”.
“But it is possible that affected properties will be able to grow crops and test them to enable trade,” they said.
Perfection Fresh declined to comment.
