At the border

Forest and Bird, Issue 281, 1 August 1996, Page 16

At the border

S BARRIERS TO trade around the world decrease and the international movement of goods and people gathers pace, the risk of unwanted biological introductions increases dramatically. For those countries, such as New Zealand, with isolated, highly endemic, and only recently modified island biotas, it is potential disaster. The routes of entry for exotic pests have increased and become more unpredictable, and at the same time the pests’ "travelling conditions’, through refrigerated air transport and containerisation, have become more favourable. On top of this, global warming with its likely temperature increases and changes in rainfall patterns and wind movements will make New Zealand a favourable environment for organisms which might not otherwise have arrived or survived here. The ramifications of more liberalised trade are profound. Trade considerations are placing pressure on quarantine authorities around the world to take greater risks, both technically and philosophically, in relation to the entry of diseases and pests. Even to restrict the movement of commodities on legitimate quarantine grounds will often not be without cost to a country’s trade reputation. The risks are not only to native flora and fauna, but to agriculture, amenity vegetation and forestry. Forest and Bird conservation director Kevin Smith points to the example of the tussock moth introduction as just one of a number of instances where animals have been introduced — accidentally or intentionally — because border controls have been too lax. "Recently we have seen a Japanese butterfly appear in a Dunedin used-car importer’s yard, a live snake was found in a used car on the Wellington wharf and now the tussock moth in Auckland. With more open trade and increased travel we are going to see more of these incidents unless we are more vigilant," Mr Smith says. MoF’s John Handiside worries that the Asian gypsy moth and other potential American pests could hitch a ride to New Zealand in second-hand logging machinery, most of which is imported from the United States where the moth is a huge pest. "The biggest problem by far is the importation of this equipment where something is taken out of a forest, not

cleaned, then brought into the country. We’ve now introduced a rule forcing people to dismantle a piece of machinery so that all the internal bits can be examined," says Handiside. In Australia recently, border control staff detected a fungal disease that entered the country on second-hand machinery. Smith says the second-hand car trade also needs to be closely examined. New Zealand imports over 6,000 used cars every month. As tussock moths prefer to lay their eggs in sheltered places, a small cluster could easily be concealed under a car’s mudguard or flap. "We're seeing a big increase in car imports but not an increase in the Ministry of Agriculture’s ability to control. A lot of the checking and cleaning is done in New Zealand — the onus needs to be put on the exporters to send us clean cars. Instead New Zealand accepts all the biological risk from the trade," says Smith. There has been a great increase in imports of plant material for pasture improvement and horticulture, as well as living plant material such as cut flowers and propagative or seed stock. These provide an obvious route of introductions for alien organisms. In Australia, poinsettia cuttings imported for the Christmas trade have recently introduced into the country a whitefly capable of crop damage worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The cuttings were supposedly fumigated, but probably, under pressure from the importers (fumigants reduce shelf life), at too low a dose. Australia is currently conducting a review of its quarantine arrangements. On the issue of intentional imports, Smith believes that MAF is too permissive in what it allows into this country. He considers the ministry is more

concerned at pleasing its counterparts overseas than with the increased risks to the New Zealand economy or to our native plants and animals that this attitude entails. "Take the proposed importation of flash-fry red turkey meat. The poultry industry sees this as a big threat to New Zealand’s avifauna and the domestic industry because it could bring in Newcastle’s disease and other serious avian diseases," he said. "MAF has released a draft import standard that would permit the import of this meat along with any viral freeloaders. Conservationists will be grateful to the poultry industry if its impressive technical submission and lobbying succeeds in stopping the imports." Smith regards it as absurd that two agencies — MoF and MAF each dealing with exotic pest irruptions in the same city at the same time (tussock moth and fruitfly) are separate. He would prefer to see an amalgamation of skills related to border control. Understaffing at MAF Quarantine is a common complaint, brought into sharp focus by the fruitfly scare earlier this year. At the Auckland waterfront there are four fewer staff than necessary, while at Napier and Tauranga staff have had difficulty in taking leave. An Audit Office report in 1994 recommended a beefing up of MAF’s border protection procedures by using sniffer dogs and organic X-ray machines but government money wasn’t forthcoming. Spending on border control has fallen at the same time as visitor numbers have increased. In 1990 the government budgeted $15.2 million for border protection; by 1996 that had dropped to $14.5 million. In the meantime overseas tourist numbers leapt by 50 percent.