Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

You must see it, Member for Hume. I recommend that you go and see it. Obviously, a movie theatre filled with screaming kids is not the place one would expect to find insight for political commentary, but this children’s movie, the Bee Movie, opened my eyes to a world without bees. When Barry the Bee discovers that humans are stealing honey from the bees and selling it for profit, it leads to him take legal action against the honey industry—in fact, he leads a class action. A rather adventurous US court finds in favour of the bees, who then shut down production. Bees all around the world are free to stop working. This leads to unintended consequences because, without bees, as the member for Hume pointed out, there is no pollination, and without pollination millions of plant species would eventually disappear. Thankfully, however, most of our native flora in Australia are not reliant on European honey bees for pollination. Unfortunately, most of our commercial crops are not native to Australia. The Australian honey bee industry generates around $70-plus million of honey and related products each year. After having been on the Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources for this inquiry, like having seen the Bee Movie, I better understand how important bees are for all of Australia.

Honey bees are not just about honey. We need honey bees to pollinate our crops in order to produce fruits, vegetables and grains. If this shut down then the Brisbane markets, which are in my electorate, would be in dire straits. Other industries like wool, meat and dairy also rely heavily on honey bees. It is estimated that honey bees contribute up to $6 billion a year to our agricultural industry. Some figures suggest that every third bite we consume in our diet is dependant on a honey bee to pollinate that food. As the member for Hume stated, they are very hardworking little animals. So 30 per cent of our diet is dependant on honey bees. Honey bees are vital to Australian agriculture, and any threat to honey bees in Australia must be taken very seriously.

Earlier this year, over Easter, I went to a school reunion at my old school in St George and caught up with one of my class mates, David Moon, who now runs a million-dollar agricultural business where they grow rockmelons. His name is Moon, so it is actually called Moonrocks. He was saying that that whole industry is 100 per cent reliant on bees and beekeepers. Even though there are no beekeepers in St George, they drive out west to pollinate the crops. But, like the bee itself, there is a sting in this tail. In response to the biosecurity threats facing the bee industry and the importance of the industry to Australian agriculture, the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Tony Burke, reactivated the inquiry into honey bees earlier this year at the request of the Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources. Exotic pests like the parasitic mite, very accurately called the Varroa destructor, loom as a major quarantine threat to our border security and to the honey bee industry. One bonus of being an island continent is that we are the only place in the world that does not have the Varroa destructor mite. However, submissions to the inquiry regarded the arrival of varroa in Australia as being a case of not really if but when. How we as a government respond to this threat and help the industry prepare for the future will be a major test.

As well as biosecurity threats the industry is facing lower profits due to international competition. The More than honey: the future of the Australian honey bee and pollination industries report offers a thorough commentary on the issues confronting the Australian honey bee industry. The government will closely consider each of the 25 recommendations made by the committee in this report. These recommendations range from improved research and training for pollination services to better biosecurity measures and a new labelling standard to reflect the composition and origin of honey bee products. As we have learned from the equine influenza disaster, biosecurity is something that we must get right and must reassess all the time. Anyone who has friends, family or neighbours who have worked in the horse industry knows how much they relied on our island status and how much they were betrayed by the shoddy standards that let the equine influenza into Australia. I commend the great work of the former High Court Judge Ian Callinan in terms of giving us some salutary lessons.

The Rudd government is committed to learning the equine influenza lesson and is also committed to a vibrant future for the honey bee industry. The Rudd government will closely consider the committee’s recommendations—including establishing guidelines for beekeeper access to public lands, maintaining and enhancing the National Sentinel Hive Program, establishing and funding a new honey bee quarantine facility and establishing and funding a national endemic pest and disease control program. I am also pleased to acknowledge that work is already underway on a number of these fronts. The government recently provided grants of around $660,000 for the industry to develop an environmental code of conduct that can be spread throughout the beekeeping industry. We are also committed to beekeeping training materials and to conducting strategic planning for the industry. That might be as simple as knowing where the hives are and who is responsible for the hives.

The government also provides assistance to the honey bee industry through quarantine services—including assessing import permit applications; screening imported bees and bee products; conducting surveillance activities on international vessels and ports of call; certifying exports, including providing export documentation; and developing export controls. A National Sentinel Hive Program at Australia’s 20 busiest ports has also been developed to assist in providing early warning of possible incursions of varroa mites. The government has also worked with the Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation to establish a new cross-industry alliance to guide the development of a commercial pollination services industry. This alliance, called Pollination Australia, will support the honey bee industry and enable continued pollination of important food crops in Australia. Pollination Australia will help drive a strong working relationship between the honey bee industry and those industries that depend on honey bee pollination, be they rockmelon growers or the many others I have listed. I encourage industry and related stakeholders to continue to work with government as we advance ways to ensure the ongoing viability of the honey bee industry.

In closing I want to thank the committee chair, the member for Lyons, Dick Adams; and the deputy chair, the member for Hume, Alby Schultz, for their efforts in driving this inquiry, which has spanned two parliaments. I also want to thank the committee secretary, Janet Holmes, and the inquiry secretary, Dr Bill Pender, and all of their staff for the high standard of work that they pulled together. This report is a fine example of bipartisan common sense. Out of respect for the member for New England, Mr Tony Windsor, perhaps I should say tripartisan common sense.

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