Never a dull moment for Australian horticultural exporters

The sector has had much to deal with over the last few months with ongoing drought and bushfires impacting key production areas. To overlay this, fresh produce exporters have other challenges in play, namely coronavirus, export certification cost increases proposed by the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment (DAWE), and hurdles in the Indonesian import application process that resulted in many rejections of importers' Recommendations to Import Horticultural Product (RIPH).

By: Andréa Magiafoglou

As many of you would be well aware, China is the number one export destination for approximately 30% of all fresh fruit exports. Trade following the Chinese New Year is typically subdued, therefore a clearer impact of the coronavirus on Australian exports will become more evident in oncoming weeks. At the time of writing, airfreight capacity has been greatly reduced with direct air services (Qantas) between mainland China and Australia (Sydney-Beijing and SydneyShanghai) suspended from 9 February until 29 March 2020. Sea freight is still a shipping option; however, concerns exist with the logistics of moving product within China. Many exporters are currently looking to distribute product to other destinations, although some commodities are limited by the number of market access pathways available to them. Despite these concerns, the Australian dollar is low, and the quality of Australian produce is excellent which bolsters the opportunities afforded to Australian exporters looking to establish trading relationships within other markets. Another hurdle for Australian exporters moving forward are the fee and levy increases for export certification proposed by the DAWE. These changes will have a varying impact on individual exporters based on business structure, export destination, commodity type, volume and value. Overall, they represent a massive 40% increase from current export certification costs. The Australian Horticultural Exporters’ and Importers’ Association has united with ten other horticultural Peak Industry Bodies in opposing these changes. This united voice across horticulture represented the majority of fresh horticultural exporters in Australia and we wait to hear the DAWE response to our submission. Alongside this, we also await the release of the Independent Review into Export Certification by Ernst & Young, who were commissioned by the department. Onto Indonesia; towards the end of 2019, it came to our attention that the revised regulations for the Recommendations to Import Horticultural Product (RIPH) by the Indonesian Ministry of Agriculture had resulted in many rejections of importers' RIPH applications. As you may recognise, obtaining an RIPH from the Ministry of Agriculture’s DirectorateGeneral of Horticulture is a prerequisite for obtaining an import license from the Ministry of Trade for many horticultural commodities. The new conditions mainly revolve around GAP certification. Since then, we are happy to report that the revised regulations have since been amended, which now eliminates GAP, GHP, and exporter capacity statement for those origins with food safety Country Recognition Agreement (CRA), which Australia has with Indonesia. However, and at latest notice, some delays were still being felt with a backlog of applications by importing companies that, whilst approved by the Indonesian Directorate-General of Agriculture, were still awaiting the Indonesian Minister of Agriculture’s signature. Hopefully progress will soon be made, and exporters will be able to realise the opportunity to deliver high quality produce under the Indonesia-Australia Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (IA-CEPA) which looks to come into force in early 2020.