What to look out for after FMD email scam emerges
Scammers are using foot and mouth disease fears to try to get farmer details with fraudulent messages going to producers and industry players.
Scammers are feeding on the fear of the threat of foot and mouth disease by sending out emails asking for farmer details.
The Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry has warned producers to be alert for scam emails after becoming “aware of a fraudulent email campaign using the outbreak of foot and mouth disease in Indonesia to hook in victims”.
“These criminal scams often use news and current events to dupe people out of their personal information, a process known as “phishing”,” a department spokesman said.
“They send fraudulent emails or text messages pretending to be from large organisations you know or trust.”
Farmers, industry and others have received the emails and the departmental spokesman said they would never send emails asking for online banking logins, credit card details or passwords.
Federal Agriculture Minister Murray Watt said official information should be sought from the DAFF website on biosecurity issues.
“Australians take biosecurity very seriously, and it’s extremely disappointing to hear reports of potential scammers exploiting that,” Minister Watt said.
Plan to vaccinate all livestock in Bali
A $32-million plan to vaccinate all livestock in Bali could protect Australia from the devastating impacts of foot and mouth disease, experts say.
The plan, drawn up by a key cattle industry player with direct working knowledge of the Indonesian cattle industry, would see all the estimated 1.35 million cattle, sheep, pigs and goats fully vaccinated on the Indonesian holiday island within a year.
But the proposal is yet to be presented to Agriculture Minister Murray Watt and has drawn mixed reactions from industry bodies
The plan and budget has been developed by industry stalwart and current Queensland Livestock Exporters Association president Greg Pankhurst.
Mr Pankhurst, who co-owned two Indonesian feedlots for almost two decades, calculated the cost of the four-vaccine program, which would involve 50 vaccination teams and support resources. The plan covers everything from renting office space to airfares to guards, fuel for vehicles and even an incentive for some Balinese farmers to encourage vaccination.
Indonesian-based veterinarian Dr Ross Ainsworth said the proposed vaccination plan “showed the back of the envelope cost is in the order of $32 million” and that Mr Pankhurst had worked on it “given the apparent lack of a coherent plan”
“Assuming this was accepted by the Indonesian government, it has the potential to bring the risk of FMD transmission from Bali to Australia from red hot to minimal, just like the rest of Asia,” said Dr Ainsworth, the author of the South East Asian Beef Market Report.
Dr Ainsworth said the risk of FMD coming into Australia was “getting higher and higher”.
“With minimal vaccination in Bali, the risk of transmission is high and rising,” he said.
“Rome is burning and the fire is in the neighbour’s house. Australia needs to do more to protect itself from the FMD wildfire.
“I don’t doubt that our government is trying but I also expect that the Indonesian Government simply doesn’t have the same level of urgency.”
Both the wool and the meat industries have significant industry funds which supporters say could fund the vaccination plan.
Australian Wool Innovation currently holds $85 million in reserves while Meat and Livestock Australia has a similar amount and spent more than $280 million in 2020/21 on research, development and marketing.
AWI chief executive John Roberts said the organisation “continues to invest with governments and other organisations involved in the livestock industry to help prevent the spread of FMD”.
“AWI is willing to play its part in tackling this threat and is happy to consider proposals from industry that have the support of veterinary authorities from the Commonwealth and state governments”.
MLA was more guarded, with a spokesman telling The Weekly Times the organisation “is working with the Federal Government to best direct resources into vaccine support that are aligned with the Indonesian government priorities”.
National Farmers’ Federation chief executive Tony Mahar said the plan had not been presented to its organisation but they would “support actions that focus response efforts on areas of highest risk and need” but at the same time, respected Indonesia as a sovereign nation.
“The NFF has welcomed efforts from the Australian Government to offer technical, vaccine and other support measures to Indonesia,” Mr Mahar said.
“Industry, too, is working hard to support our regional partners, with organisations such as MLA building on longstanding partnerships to offer support programs during this period.”
Mr Mahar said the NFF had welcomed the ramping up in biosecurity measures, but “we do want them to go further”.
“This means 100 per cent screening of passengers returning from Indonesia and high-risk areas, more front-line biosecurity officers, and constant review of physical and technological screening methods.” he said.
“We will not lay down on our call for long term sustainable biosecurity funding, as well as the finalisation of the National Biosecurity Strategy.”
A spokesman for Senator Watt said the Federal Government was already supporting the Indonesian Government’s vaccine program by investing $1.5 million to deliver at least one million vaccinations along with technical and logistics assistance to assist with its ongoing work.
“We are listening to, and working with industry on practical measures and will continue to do so,” the spokesman said.
Official Indonesian government data showed there were 554 cases of livestock infected with FMD in Bali last week with 27,480 animals vaccinated against the disease. This represents less than 2 per cent of all the cattle, sheep and pigs estimated to be on the holiday island.
But on Monday, the Indonesian Government told media the outbreak on Bali was now under control.
Meanwhile, a traveller was last week pinged for bringing beef and pork into Australia from Indonesia. A sniffer dog identified the products in the traveller’s backpack and he was fined more than $2000 and the food — two Sausage and Egg McMuffins and a ham croissant — are now being tested for traces of FMD.
It’s ‘one of the best’ for dairy
THERE was more upside than not for dairy farmers this year despite a raft of challenges.
Underpinning the positivity were good milk prices, strong returns for excess cattle and a season that was largely kind to most of eastern Australia.
Balancing the upsides have been labour shortages and a wet spring, which took some of the shine off the positive sentiment within the industry.
Dairy Australia senior industry analyst Sofia Omstedt said 2021 would go down as “one of the best years in recent memory” for many dairy farmers.
Ms Omstedt said a 7 per cent year-on-year lift in milk prices, favourable seasonal conditions in the first half of the year and subdued input costs resulted in one of the most profitable years on dairy farms since 2013-14.
While the wet spring had caused issues with flooding and haymaking, she said it also replenished water storages and dampened irrigation water costs.
Milk prices had been underpinned by a weaker Australian dollar and competition between processors to secure milk.
“Global demand for dairy has remained incredibly resilient during the Covid-19 pandemic and grown in the past three months as more countries emerge from lockdowns,” Ms Omstedt said.
“As Australia’s milk pool remains stagnant and is looking unlikely to grow this year, fierce competition for milk among processors is likely to continue to be a feature of the processing landscape going forward, which is supportive of farmgate milk prices.”
Australian Dairy Farmers president Rick Gladigau, from Mt Torrens in South Australia, said the seasonal challenges in some areas could not be downplayed. “In
NSW and parts of Queensland, they have had fires and have floods, droughts, mice, they’ve had everything,” Mr Gladigau said.
Finding labour was also a major issue — a lack of backpackers and border restrictions through Covid-19 taking a toll.
But good milk prices were a balm to these pains. “Prices are pretty good — of course we’ll always take more — and it’s the third year in a row prices have been up, and next year we are still talking a similar thing,” he said. “In all my time in dairying, the past couple of years have been one of the better continual times we have had in terms of reasonable seasons, pretty good milk prices to go with it.”
Mr Gladigau said input costs for the new year were a concern, especially fertiliser and chemicals.
Farmer optimism about the industry was varied.
Confidence in dairying is there, but it’s not stopping people leaving the industry — older farmers who have gone through the cycles before are seeing great beef prices, people wanting to buy land and cows, and high milk prices, so some are choosing to get out at the top,” he said. “It’s turned out a pretty good year ... if you consider milk price, wishywashy season for some, good cattle prices — it’s been one of the better ones I’ve had.”
Source: Fiona Myers, Weekly Times, 15 December 2021