3 minute read
Farm biosecurity practices
BY TRUYEN VO REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT OFFICER, VEGETABLESWA
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Highlights
• Adopters enhanced farm biosecurity practices. • Factors influencing farmers’ practice changes in farm biosecurity are identified. • Strategies to foster grower adoption of farm biosecurity practices are recommended.
Problems and opportunities
In recent years the vegetable industry in Western Australia has been hit hard by two exotic pest incursions — CGMMV in August 2016 and TPP in February 2017. The state is also under threat of fall armyworm (FAW) and serpentine leaf miner (SLM). On the other hand, preliminary results of the Area wide management of vegetable diseases: viruses and bacteria project in WA (VG16086)1 reveals contagious vegetable diseases and pests such as bacterial canker, nematodes and different types of viral diseases being continuous threats.
Improving WA growers capacity in planning and implementing farm biosecurity plan and plant protection management is essential to protect the multimillion dollars vegetable industry in WA.
Literature from both national and regional projects in this area showed extension resources such as farm biosecurity plans and practice guidance have been valuable2 .
However, stronger extension activity at a grassroots level is needed to facilitate wider grower adoption.
Enhancing grower decision making in relation to farm biosecurity practices
Over a series of workshops, vegetablesWA through the vegNET project has introduced growers to knowledge and information about historical pest and disease incursion incidents, fundamental pest and disease management, IPM, area wide management of plant pests and diseases, farm biosecurity plans and practice guidance. A core group of seven growers has been encouraged to try changes in plant pest management using this recently introduced knowledge. Grower participants have been assisted in developing and finetuning farm biosecurity plans to see the relative advantages (the degree to which new practices are perceived to be better than those it supersedes); compatibility (consistency with existing values, past experiences and needs) and observability (the visibility of results).
f GROWERS and stakeholders listening to the Tomato Biosecurity Presentation.
100% grower participants complied with recommended seed and seedling management.
Benchmarking the practice changes
Benchmarking of growers’ practice changes against items listed in the farm biosecurity checklist, which included cleaning vehicles and machinery, controlling access to growing zones, sourcing of seeds and planting materials, monitoring of pests and diseases and managing packaging and pallets.
Analysis of the benchmarking results was carried out to better understand the levels of practice change among members of the grower focus group
The benchmarking results showed that 100% of grower participants implemented some practice changes in farm biosecurity over the life of the project. However, the level of practice change varied among the focus group members. The grower with the highest level of adoption of biosecurity practices indicated they were using 31 of the 38 recommended strategies listed on the checklist compared to other members of the group who had adopted between 18 and 26 of the strategies. All growers improved their biosecurity practices through the extension activity as the initial average for the group was 11/38. 100% of grower participants adopted the recommended seed and seedlings management and packages and pallets management practices.
f GROWERS holding up Biosecurity signs given by vegetablesWA.
High levels of improvement were also recorded in growers’ management of vehicle movement, farm visitors and staff hygiene and sanitation practices. In contrast, the benchmarking results also revealed no improvements in a few aspects of biosecurity practices including inspection of wash down facilities, checking of farm visitors’ clothing, footware and tools for soil and organic matter and the management of vermin, feral animals, weeds and wildlife populations around growers farms.
Suggestions for improvement
Discussion with growers during the investigation revealed that the higher compliance with good farm biosecurity practices were observed on farms that utilise professional advisors such as agronomists. These services are essential to grower businesses by nature, thus no extension effort for improvement is needed. On the other hand, low improvements on other farms in the focus group can be explained by growers not seeing direct benefits of implementing the suggested practices in relation to the control of specific pest and diseases that are impacting their production. Therefore, integrating general farm biosecurity practices with specific pest and disease management strategies will enhance growers’ adoption.
MORE INFORMATION
Truyen Vo, Regional Development Officer, phone (08) 9486 7515, 0457 457 559 or email truyen.vo@vegetableswa.com.au
