Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia

The Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia Launch webinar: Program overview transcript

(Duration 56 mins)

7 November 2025

Introduction

This is the transcript of the webinar for the launch of Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia. It was presented by the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry.  The online event aimed to inform participants about the pledge’s role in promoting proactive biosecurity practices across businesses and their operations and supply chains.  It targeted individuals, representatives from state and local government, industry representatives, business owners and supply chain managers.

Transcript

[Webinar begins]

Philippe Frost: Hello. Good morning, everyone. 

I think we are now live for the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia launch.

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today. I'd like to begin this morning's proceedings by acknowledging the traditional custodians and owners of the land and waters on which we meet today. For me, I'm joining you from Ngunnawal country here in Canberra. I'd also like to acknowledge their elders, past and present, and any other Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people who may be present here today.

I'm Philippe Frost, your host for today, and I'm honoured to launch the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia with you. This programme is an important initiative for enhancing our nation's biosecurity and supporting business to embed good biosecurity practices.

Today, you'll hear from the team at the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, otherwise known as DAFF, who are coordinating the pledge programme. You'll also hear from our New Zealand counterparts who will share insights from their successful programme and how this connects to the department's other initiatives to support industry. For any questions, please use the Q and A function at the top right-hand corner of your Teams screen and we will respond to you towards the end of today's presentation.

Now, to provide an overview of the new pledge programme, I would love to hand over to Damien Jeffs from the Department's Biosecurity, Education and Engagement section here at DAFF. Damien, I'll pass over to you. Thank you.

Damien Jeffs: Thank you Philippe, and good morning, everyone.

My name is Damien Jeffs. I'm an Assistant Director at the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, and I'm leading the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia program. We really appreciate you joining us for the launch of the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia program, and we're excited to partner with industry on this initiative. The aim of the pledge programme is for you to protect your business, strengthen your industry, and ultimately safeguard Australia and our way of life. This will be achieved by participating businesses proactively incorporating biosecurity practises into their operations and supply chains.

It's also about recognising biosecurity is a shared responsibility and that risks are best managed before they reach Australian shores. The pledge program incorporates two activities. The first is taking the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia. The second is joining the Biosecurity Business Network. By joining the biosecurity business network, you can participate in educational information sharing activities such as webinars on biosecurity risk management topics and practises and gain access to tools and resources. The pledge also focuses on promoting the importance of biosecurity to your customers, employees, suppliers, and stakeholders. This will have the added benefit of increasing the general awareness of biosecurity and why it matters to the broader community.

So, in summary, our objective is to reduce risk by implementing biosecurity measures to help protect your business from costly disruptions caused by pests, diseases and other threats. Support continuity with strong biosecurity practises that ensure smoother operations and greater confidence across your supply chain. Lead by example through the biosecurity Business Network and access practical tools to strengthen your management of biosecurity risk and promote your commitment by showcasing your biosecurity practises and share your experience to inspire others in your industry with branded materials.

Our focus is on education and information. We will be providing you with tools, resources to best manage biosecurity risk and support you in sharing the message about a shared biosecurity culture. With that in mind, the program isn't linked to any regulatory functions or will involve any form of audits. However, we are anticipating that by taking part in the pledge program, your audit compliance will improve in other audit activities carried out by the department. It's also important to note that there's no cost in taking the pledge or in joining the biosecurity business network. You choose your level of involvement depending on your own particular needs and your areas of interest.

We have developed the pledge program with a focus on industry. This co-design approach involved engaging with you early and committing to further development after listening to your business needs related to best practise biosecurity risk management, but we do have to give credit to our colleagues from New Zealand. We have been inspired by the biosecurity business pledge. In fact, we've modelled our programme to closely align with the New Zealand Biosecurity business pledge, and we'll continue to closely work with the New Zealand pledge team to develop shared tools and resources. 

It's also my great pleasure to have Debbie Teale, the executive director of the New Zealand Biosecurity Business Pledge, joining us today to talk about their journey, the program's value, and its successes.

The pledge program is also linked to the National Biosecurity strategy. The National Biosecurity strategy provides a collective vision for Australia's future biosecurity system, which is a biosecurity system that protects Australia's way of life. The pledge programme is an activity in the National Biosecurity Strategy Action Plan 2024.

Co-leading this initiative with us is Biosecurity Tasmania, who we work closely with. So, the pledge programme really is a collective effort for the benefit of Australia.  So, what is the pledge and how did we select the undertaking? We engaged with industry, including many of you here today, to create a biosecurity business pledge for Australia. This resulted in the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia, a pledge developed for industry, with industry, for industry.

So, what does the pledge involve? The pledge has six undertakings. It covers topics on shared responsibility for biosecurity management, looking for and addressing risks across all aspects of your operations, taking a proactive approach to biosecurity risk management including best practise biosecurity measures in procurement processes, helping customers, employees, suppliers, and stakeholders recognise the importance of biosecurity, and working closely with the Australian government to strengthen biosecurity.

For some businesses, you may already be doing this. For other businesses, it's about undertaking that journey.  So how can you take the pledge and how can you join the Biosecurity business network? By visiting biosecurity.gov.au/pledge, you'll be able to find our landing page and information about the pledge program.

There you'll find that taking the pledge is easy. By clicking on the sign-up function, you'll be taken to a web form. The web form will capture your details, confirm that you are taking the pledge, and in doing so, agreeing to become part of the Biosecurity business network. On joining, we'll contact you to welcome you to the programme and outline next steps for participation. We'll also work with you to upload your company logo on our member page on biosecurity.gov.au. So, a key takeaway for you today is visit biosecurity.gov.au/pledge. We're really excited to start working with you.

So now I'll focus on some of the key benefits associated with the pledge program. By taking part in the pledge, your business will receive access to education materials through your participation with the Biosecurity Business Network. This will evolve and increase over time. Webinars around every two months that have topics addressing biosecurity risk and how it can be best managed, a CEO guide with insights on managing biosecurity risk, and a range of materials to promote the pledge programme. 

This includes merchandise that will assist you with promoting the pledge to your customers and supply chains. We'll also provide you with a digital toolkit to engage with customers and supply chains. The toolkit features the sub-brand we've created for the pledge, which you can see at the bottom of the screen there, and it will enable you to promote it more broadly. It should also be noted that program content will be guided by network members. We will listen to your feedback and shape the programme to meet your biosecurity business needs.

So, I'll conclude my overview by emphasising that we are looking forward to partnering with you and welcome your participation. We are also happy to discuss the pledge programme with you if you require further information or if you have any questions. To reach us, our email is BBN@aff.gov.au and remember to visit biosecurity.gov.au/pledge to sign up. Thank you. I'll now hand back to Philippe.

Phillipe Frost: Thank you, Damien.

Thank you for that great overview of the programme, it really sounds like there are many reasons to join. A reminder for everyone who is online, we have quite a few attendees out there. If you have any questions, please do feel free to submit them in the Q&A at any time, and our team will get them to us at the end so we can address them.

Now, I would like to hand over to our next presenter. We'll now hear from Debbie Teale, who is Executive Director of the New Zealand Biosecurity Business Pledge. She will share some insights into the development of the programme, and Debbie will discuss how the New Zealand Pledge has fostered collaboration between businesses and the government to enhance biosecurity practises across the industry. Thank you, Debbie.

Debbie Teale: Thank you, Philippe, and thank you also Damien.

And thank you all for being here today. It's very exciting to think that New Zealand and Australia can collaborate and work together to manage and really embed biosecurity risk inside of businesses. Damien, one of those messages you said right at the start is, you know, the best way to protect our shores is to keep pests, unwanted pests and diseases offshore, so supply chains are important.

Anyway, thank you very much for having me. This is very much an area where we don't compete. It's where we win together. This is about businesses being able to work together in a pre-competitive environment. So, I would like to talk a little bit about our journey, and I'm always open to lots of questions, so feel free to fire them through.

I'd like to acknowledge Jo Darby from Biosecurity New Zealand, Ministry of Primary Industries, who is also online today. She's here with us. Jo has actually been with the Pledge right from day one, so congratulations, Jo, all the good work we do. You were part of kicking it off.

We started in October 2019, and it kicked off in New Zealand. It's the same, we're after the same thing. Actually, here in New Zealand, it was initiated by a group of key businesses and there was a bunch of business association CEOs steered by, primarily Deakins, which is the Dairy Companies Association of New Zealand. And they got together a bunch of these business associations, and they were talking with Biosecurity New Zealand and they're saying, how do we keep biosecurity at the top table? How do you keep it in the company strategy? How should we keep this alive? What should we do?

So, a bunch of them formed themselves a steering group and Biosecurity New Zealand said, right, let's kick off a programme. This is what the pledge is today and that's what you are also looking at and launching officially.

So, we had a bunch of companies come along, and they really started with their knowledge of, this is about downsizing risk for my company. Continuity. No one wants to be the director of the company that imports the containers that have got the issues and brings it into the country. They also really understand that, you know, we're only as strong as our neighbours. So, if we all work together, we all do better. 

And whilst some companies, which I'll talk about probably somewhere later in the mix, will say, hey, it's not really us, this is all about port and egg and, you know, the meat companies and the dairy companies, it's actually about all of us. We'll go a bit further into that next.

So, what do our members love? Well, actually, our members love the fact that, with what we do, we have a singular focus on biosecurity, and that they get a real return on the investments that they make. Investment is not just about those dollars, of course, it's about the cost of even focusing efforts and having some of your team working on it. But our members really understand that if we have major incursions, even some smaller incursions—we've got a couple of things happening here at the moment—they could really impact individual industries or our economy as a whole. We're talking billions of dollars, and when you're as small as New Zealand, in an economy as small as us, it's huge. 

Our businesses come on, they're concerned about looking after their own organisation, their communities, the regions they live in, and the economy as a whole. They really value the fact that we've set up a network, and it's non-judgmental because we recognise that different companies are literally at different parts of their journey. Some have resourcing, others have nothing. Some of my most active members, to be honest, are the one and two person operations, the really small transitional facilities who say, we've got all these requirements. This is what we're doing. Can you find us some more tips on what we can do here? We really recognise that we're helping one another. That pre-competitive thing is really important.

I'll just give you one example. Fonterra, being our largest dairy company, created business travel tips. So, when you've got your people going offshore travelling for business, here are some tips reminding them what to do to downsize the biosecurity risks when they came back into the country. They did that, created the training, created everything, and supplied it and they gave it to us at the pledge, and we shared that with all our members. So, all the other dairy companies can pick it up. The whole thing about having this wonderful collaborative way of working is that you're supporting and you're equipping everybody, not just your own organisation.

I've got to say, our members really, really value having Biosecurity New Zealand, the regulator, as our key partner. We did actually begin as a programme inside Biosecurity New Zealand, and they've always supported us really deeply with both money. They share insights, they co-create resources with us, they give us access to different biosecurity spaces for tours for our members, because our members love to go and see things in person, because they like to keep it real and actually see something. While they're there, they talk to other members and go, “Hey, by the way, we had a terrible audit. We really don't know what we're doing about X, Y, Z. Can I come and talk to you?”

So, you're creating, at the same time as you're building capability within my members, my members are talking to one another and they're creating a network. So, we're increasing capabilities as well as capacity around the country, and with those people knowing who to contact in other businesses, they really appreciate it. Biosecurity New Zealand has been outstanding with us, they are, of course, the regulator. They sometimes come to our webinars, and they'll test something that they're developing, and business can give feedback.

We have this fabulous dialogue that can occur where business might say, “Yeah, but if you do that, you create X, Y, Z issue with us.” You know, that's a triple, that's a triple thing we've got to do now instead of one step. So, it's a really wonderful way of having government and business working together to strengthen the system together, and, in particular, our part. We know that Biosecurity New Zealand really values this work because they continue to support us today.

So here we are in 2025. Along the way, along our journeys, we started with 69 companies. Now, we were, it was voluntary. Our pledge and people signed up, much the same commitments as you're talking, so that's why I won't go over them. We built ourselves up to 450 members. We had a steering group, which was also volunteering, and it was on top of their day to day jobs.

Now, COVID, of course, came along and disrupted all of us. I was actually brought along to review the pledge. My background as a consultant means that I often conducted reviews. So in the middle of COVID, I took a look at it and saw this immense value because business was very much getting distracted, as we all were, with how to handle this inclusion, this health inclusion, which was, I have to say, advantageous for us because we used it really hard and fast as well to remind people don't drop biosecurity, this is what could happen, etc. So, I conducted the review and, very foolishly said, oh gosh, in New Zealand, the way that we work, the way that our budgets and governments work. If we don't find a way to stand this up as a stand-alone entity and resource it properly, it could get forgotten or changed.

It takes a change of a CEO, a change of a government, and we'd lose funding. So, for my sins, I delivered a report to Biosecurity New Zealand—hi, Joe, again—and the DDG at the time was Penny Nelson. I really encouraged them to, you know, go forth and multiply this pledge. Because when I was talking to companies, they genuinely were saying to me—and I always, I take fright at this—one huge brand that should know better, the person said to me, “Oh, we say we do, but we don't. Who can you put me on to? Because one day I'm going to get busted that, you know, in my area, we're not doing this properly. Where can we go?” So, I saw a real value in this pledge is that it's neutral. It's a neutral zone where people can come to. So, businesses do often ask me, “Where can we go?” 

What I was going to say is for my sins, and because I said, let's stand it up as a stand-alone entity, because if business wants it, it will also contribute. I suggested that we go forward. So, we are actually an incorporated society. We went down that pathway, and we registered in 2024.

I am now also the executive director, and I've had to learn a lot about biosecurity; it was not my background, but what I've been doing is helping get this network together where we build the tools, and we have that fabulous dialogue between business and government. So, we've got membership everywhere now, and as I said, we have small and we have large.

We've, we, what do they really value? We have webinars, roughly one per month now. Next year, we're doing a lot of regional events because our members want to get together in person. The different sorts of events we're doing—as we go to distribution centres, we go to the animal health labs, we go to the plant health lab, the airports, like we're going to Queenstown Airport and we're having the business associations join us. We've got a whole lot of things next year all around the regions.

The head of Biosecurity New Zealand is Stuart Anderson. What I've found is that if I collaborate with Stu's team in advance, as like we've already locked into Stuart's diary next year, that he can attend in person a range of our events. That's taken us a while to get there. Stuart has said it's a priority for him, because it's a great way for him to engage directly with business. So, we've got big businesses, small, we've got associations, we've got Science Institutes, so we've got a lot of knowledge there. Members love the fact that we co-develop resources. Damien mentioned earlier on, it was probably a couple of years ago now, maybe 18 months ago, I'm losing my timing, but we developed guides for CEOs and boards. We wanted to make sure you keep biosecurity at the top table.

What happened to our membership: when we moved to a stand-alone entity, we did lose a lot. We lost mainly the small ones that did not want to pay. And that's OK. Everything we developed, pretty much everything, still goes live on our website, so any business organisation can still access what we developed. Then we do have a members only section, which is for the presentations from webinars.

How do you, you know, one of the things that I get asked, is, how do you go from vision to action? So, I guess when I get this sort of question at me, there's two things. One is, when this concept came up in New Zealand—and congrats to those people that went for it and started it; I wasn't there—the 69 organisations and Biosecurity New Zealand, I don't think anyone at that time 100% knew what they were getting going. But they literally said, let's just start. Let's make a clear link to your business strategy. You know, let's make it real to business. So, we don't want an incursion. In New Zealand, directors' liabilities are pretty much equivalent to your health and safety liabilities. So, keep that clear link. If we can keep that clear link out there in a commercial case for action, as well as the greater good messaging, we found businesses started to really pick up and go, oh, yeah, we're in. OK, we're interested.

One of the things that also means is making sure that we've got resourcing. So, we've made sure now that we help our members deliver on their pledge commitments. One of the most exciting things that we've done this year was an idea around awareness. It came out of the way that we run our governance: we have a board, and then we have a member’s reference group. Members reference group said, let's have a biosecurity week. Let's do a whole lot of awareness stuff. Then all the industry groups fought over what that week would be, because we've got this week already in our calendars, we've got that, and we were listening, going, what do we do? Joe Darby—she's on the phone—texted me Friday night and said, “let's do a month.” So, we kicked off, soft launched one last year, this year, way more coordinated, and we had our Biosecurity Awareness month just before your Australian Biosecurity Awareness Week.

It was amazing to see all our big companies using all these social media channels, putting it out through their different newsletters, podcasts, like the awareness that we drove up, and then the traffic that went into our website. So, we know what tools then got downloaded. We've got posters and cards for this and that and all sorts.

So, look, I'm doing a heck of a lot of talking here, and I'm just really proud of you guys over on the other side of the Tasman. We are really looking forward to working with you, because we can develop and share tools for all of our companies—we're trading together so much. We've got members who will end up being your members and vice versa. It's a wonderful initiative. Business really, really value it. And I know that if the head of Biosecurity New Zealand is basically telling me a year out where he would like to have events and be able to come and engage with my members, that it's valuable to him as well.

I'm going to stop talking because I've just really went hard and fast at you. Would you like me to take questions now or later?

Philippe Frost: Oh, someone was going to say something, and I think we're going to do questions after, Debbie, but please feel free to put your questions in the Q&A.

I'd just like to say thank you very much to Debbie. That wasn't too much talking at all. It was really interesting to hear about what our colleagues are doing across the ditch in New Zealand. It's really inspiring to see the shared benefits that can be achieved from that open communication and working together to protect biosecurity. So, fantastic.

I will move on to our next speaker. It is my pleasure to introduce our next speaker who is Ben Rowntree. Ben is the director of Sea Cargo Policy and Strategic Engagement here at DAFF. Ben will be speaking on biosecurity interventions and detections, highlighting the critical role they play in safeguarding Australia. So, I'll hand over to Ben now, thank you.

Ben Rowntree: Thank you, Philippe, and I do want to thank Damien for inviting me along today and giving me an opportunity to present.

The Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia launch is very exciting to me within biosecurity. For me, I hope it brings biosecurity to the front of mind to more people, particularly those that are not typically impacted by the department on a day-to-day basis.

It was interesting to see when Debbie put up some of those members, there are certainly entities in there which I am familiar with within my role in biosecurity, so that is exciting as well. As Philippe said, my name is Ben Rowntree. I'm the director of Sea Cargo Policy and Strategic Engagement from Cargo and Conveyance Policy Branch in Biosecurity Operations Division. I know that's a mouthful. I live and breathe biosecurity day in, day out.

Today I am presenting on what I have been calling the biosecurity detections and social contract, or what I really mean is how everyone who interacts with imported goods has some biosecurity responsibility. Australia has key exports in agriculture and horticultural goods, and for Australia's clean and green reputation for good products to be exported, we need to maintain a strong biosecurity border. It is a topic that I'm passionate about, as I have within my remit two primary functions, one being sea cargo policy with responsibilities for import conditions of inorganic goods that may contain biosecurity risk material, but also including non-commodity concerns such as shipping containers and managing rural risks.

I have an engagement function where I get to talk to industry on a range of topics, biosecurity related.  But before I dive in, I do want to provide a bit of context for why anyone that handles imported goods are in the business of biosecurity.

Australia is a trading country. I'm sure you are all very much aware of the increasing trade and imports coming into Australia year on year. According to Australian Border Force, they are predicting an increase in trade of 70% over the coming 5 to 10 years. For the 24-25 financial year there were 4.5 million declarations of goods coming into Australia, which was an increase of 3.7% over the previous financial year. The department conducted 365,000 document assessments and 167,000 inspections across all pathways, so not just cargo but mail and travellers. Cargo screening resulted in 19,400 pest and disease identifications. So those are things that we have found at the border and sent for identification.

Within these numbers, there were 2.6 million shipping containers imported, with 681,000 assessed, or roughly 26% of containers having some form of intervention by the department. That means there was over 1.9 million containers delivered to importers' premises without intervention. These are containers that the department has assessed as of a lower risk for biosecurity concerns, with the commodity not being of a biosecurity concern and the non-commodity being able to be managed by an accredited person within the department.

On these numbers, if we were to inspect all these containers, it would take us an additional 480,000 hours of resourcing to inspect every one of these containers. So, you can tell why we actually only inspect the high risk, and we look to allow the low risk to go, but that doesn't necessarily mean the low risk isn't without biosecurity concern.

To avoid the need to inspect every container that arrives in Australia, we put in place some mechanisms to remove the need of 100% intervention. The department assesses biosecurity risks posed by imported goods from two main perspectives: commodity and non-commodity concerns. Non-commodity concerns consider the container origin, packaging, transportation, unpacked destination, among other factors in determining the level of biosecurity risk posed. Nearly every imported container carrying goods has to meet the documentary requirements that the container and the shipments are clean and free of biosecurity risk material on arrival.

The department then has two lines of assurance: a documentary verification assurance across accredited persons, and a cargo compliance verification inspection assurance programme as well, where we intervene on containers at importer's premises. Ideally, this should be sufficient for entities to understand the non-commodity concerns of shipping containers arriving in Australia and therefore have acted appropriately in meeting these conditions prior to loading, and in most cases, that is the case.

However, as can be seen from these pictures, unfortunately these requirements are not always met. These are pictures of containers and goods found with biosecurity material at importer's premises or later. This is where the social contract comes in with importers and other entities that form part of supply chains.

The first two examples on the top left here show signs of soil and seed contamination. The soil contamination can come from previous consignments or from dirty pallets or packaging. Heavy seed contamination is most likely left over from previous consignments that that container has held. Seed and soil can be vectors for a range of significant plant and animal diseases, such as our number one and number five plant pests, Xylella and Karnal bunt, and soil can be a vector for animal diseases such as foot and mouth disease as well.

The next two pictures are khapra beetle larvae that have emerged from the bottom of a container and crawled into a commodity—in this case, nappies. But we've also seen them infest refrigerators and highchairs in separate incidents. Khapra beetle is our number two plant pest. Over the past five years, it has emerged as a hitchhiker pest, with the ability to live inside shipping containers for long periods of time. Infestation of shipping containers is usually caused by previous consignments of infested plant products such as seeds, grains, and nuts.

In instances khapra beetle has been detected, it has resulted in significant efforts by the department to track down goods at importers' premises and in some cases when delivered to people's homes. The importer and other parts of the supply chain should be able to manage these goods. However, it does create significant amount of work and in some cases the department has had to come in and manage goods, and manage premises, including transport as well.

The fourth picture is a bird's nest, which is fairly obvious, easy to spot, harder to control while a container is en-route. However, it is important to report if a container is received at a premises with this type of debris, as it is a vector for bird diseases such as highly pathogenic avian influenza among other things.

The last picture is a good one, but it is very difficult to see what it is. It may look like seed contamination, but these are brown marmorated stink bugs, or BMSB. This was a container that had a consignment infested at the time with live BMSB. Stink bugs such as BMSB and yellow spotted stink bug are number eight on our national priority plant pests.

So, as you can see, all these pests are significant to Australia. These are examples of risks, both contamination, infestation, and hitchhiker pests. These are not exhaustive but demonstrate the risks and how the department categorises the risk. Other hitchhikers can be present, such as various types of snails and ants, just to name a few.

When ordering goods or interacting with suppliers, it's important to remind exporters that Australia has strict biosecurity regulations that cover both commodity and non-commodity, and containers need to be free of risk material inside and out prior to loading.

Onto some of the pests that we do deal with in a more formal manner year in, year out. As mentioned previously, BMSB is number eight on our plant priority list. It is a seasonal pest and a hitchhiker pest. BMSB are native to northern Asia, so countries like China, Korea, and Japan. But over the past 15 years and more, have become an invasive species in 37 European and North American countries. The department has specific import conditions for goods subject to BMSB that are exported between 1 September to 30 April every year. The requirements to treat these goods, as they are likely vectors for the pest.

In colder months in their native countries, BMSBs seek warm, comfortable places to overwinter. They congregate in large numbers and are therefore susceptible in being transported easily around the globe. There is a great YouTube clip of a farming community in Maryland, USA—it's about 13 years old now—where there was a farmer being interviewed and the BMSB are flying around her and around her face similar to the way we have flies in the outback. It gives you an indication of how invasive the pest can be.

BMSB is a pest we have specifically tracked numbers of detections since the 2018-2019 season. Last season we had particularly high numbers of bugs being found post biosecurity in traps around approved arrangements, ports, and importers' premises. So, it is a key one to keep an eye out for when you are importing goods, particularly out of Europe, the US, and Northern Asia. This is a key pest to monitor as you unpack containers. As the pictures show, they may be found in significant numbers and usually are.

For more information on BMSB and the import conditions and regulations for managing BMSB, you can find it on our website at agriculture.gov.au/BMSB.

Another stink bug that we have started to monitor more formally due to increasing numbers of detections is the yellow spotted stink bug. Yellow spotted stink bug has been an emerging concern over the last few years. Where three or four years ago, we may have seen a handful of detections, but we're now seeing it often enough that we are reporting on the numbers that we are detecting. This is another stink bug that is native to Northern Asia, China, Korea, and Japan.

We tend to detect these early in the BMSB season, so from September, October, and November. They have similar behavioural instincts to BMSB although they do not congregate in such high numbers. The types of goods that you will see these on are similar to BMSB with machinery, equipment and vehicles being likely vectors. However, in the last few months we have had detections associated with furniture, and previously we've seen them detected with caravans as well.

With increased detections, this forum is a great opportunity for me to raise awareness of this pest, to remain vigilant when handling cargo containers, particularly at this time of year.

So, what does all this mean? With nearly two million containers and increasing every year, not receiving direct departmental intervention, it is a perfect reminder of the importance of industry as part of managing biosecurity at the border.

All imported goods have the possibility to have a biosecurity risk contamination. Some, such as shipping containers, may be more likely than others. If you handle imported goods, you are in the business of biosecurity. When handling containers and cargo, it is important to remain vigilant of live and dead animals, invertebrates and molluscs such as snails, including signs of them such as egg masses, frass around palettes, plant soil matter, which can contain all number of things.

When talking to suppliers, exporters and freight forwarders that pack your shipping containers, please ensure that they are aware of Australia's biosecurity regulations, particularly those relating to non-commodity concerns, such as cleaning shipping containers prior to loading and avoiding situations where infestation may occur, including where a container sits during packing. Then when unpacking a container, be aware and vigilant of signs of biosecurity material and contamination. If something is detected, close the container and contact the department as soon as is possible.

The department has a hotline for when detections are occurring, for all the public. So, if you do find something, reach out to the See Secure Report Hotline on 1-800-798-636, or there is an online form that can be found through the department's website. This will ensure that we can manage biosecurity with industry as is appropriate. Thank you.

Philippe Frost: Thank you, Ben, for those fantastic behind the scenes insights.

I think many people will be surprised to see what is found at our border in the most unlikely of places and the interruption that this has on business. The nappy example really puts a new spin on dirty nappies, and I've also seen the video you mentioned of the BMSB person just swatting their face and the house behind them is just covered with bugs. It is a real scary sight, but also a great reminder to all of us, at the end there to see, secure and report.

We do have a few questions lined up in our Q&A, so I will actually go straight ahead to Debbie for our first one, and that question is: how do pledge members, Debbie, take biosecurity best practise from vision to implementation?

Debbie Teale: Oh, thanks for that.

Gosh, that is a really good question because also what is “best biosecurity practice” when you're across all sorts of industries, large and small? Look, I think I'll keep it really practical and then I'll talk about how our members can really contribute to the success of all this.

It starts at the board table. The board table—whether that's a mother, father, family operation or one of our large organisations—really need to understand what risk is and what it means for their business. They need to look at what their interventions and measures are. When they're engaging with us at the pledge and being a member, they share their resources and case studies, what works and what hasn't worked, because our business members are conscious that they need to build a biosecurity culture within their own organisation and then outwards into the supply chains, etc.

One of the things our members do as a way to take it from best practise and absolutely implement it, is they actually help us co-develop materials because they say it gets pretty hard in isolation to be constantly bringing through new things to keep it alive inside your organisation.

So, we get asked all the time for awareness tools, quizzes, posters. We've been asked to do things for our workplace members, where they've got people with English as a second language. So, we're, you know, one of the things we may get to is translating in time some of our materials. We get asked all the time for stuff in training because again, it's just constantly keeping it fresh for the front line. The people at the front line are the ones that are literally opening the containers.

But equally, you've got to remember, for a lot of members—for us, we have a lot of the ports and the airports on our staff—they've got people coming onto their workplaces, going inside. So, you've also got to make sure you're really looking out and keeping the topic alive for your contractors, your visitors to your site. That stuff around taking it and implementing it and keeping it real is, sometimes it's just little steps that you learn from another business and you take it. We had a tour of the new Kmart distribution centre here in Hamilton recently, and it is the latest facility with robotics, etc., and their biosecurity work and what they're doing at that major distribution centre was fantastic, but we had members with us, looking, they saw the visual management board that Kmart is using. “Can we pick up that?” Kmart said yes and sent through the template.

Sometimes it's just encouraging businesses to all take another step and it so it can be a small thing to take it through to better practise within a business. Exactly what this looks like—we don't audit our members. We're not about that. What we're about is all of us working together, collaborating. Our members help us develop all our tools. We test them with our members before we go live. If business is active, business leans in, that's how we go well, and that I believe has been a key part of keeping our membership strong. We had a company sign up today—hey Joe, didn't tell you we've got a new member today—and you know we're not even out there trying to drive it at the moment. It's still coming to us.

So, look, I thought it was a really good question. We don't audit them, they tell us that they're doing things, that's great, we don't mind. We are here to encourage and improve awareness, capability, capacity.

I'll stop.

I'll hand it back to Philippe.

Philippe Frost: Thanks, Debbie.

It's really true what you say. A lot of those little things, when they're shared amongst businesses and people, and then multiplied, they really begin to have some powerful effects. It's brilliant to hear that it is quite easy for businesses to make impacts in their space.

Another question I have now is for Damien from DAFF. This one is about success. So how will success be measured and will there be metrics or reporting expectations for pledged businesses?

Damien Jeffs: Thanks, Philippe.

Looking at this program, our focus is about education and assisting companies and businesses, so there will be no formal audit of the programme, but we do want to show success.

When we look at the pledge, there's two parts: there's the information we provide and there's also the fact that you'll be promoting the business pledge itself. When we look at metrics, we'll be measuring the number of businesses that take the pledge and join the biosecurity business network. We will, with your consent, look at your audit scores for other non-related audits that are undertaken because what we're trying to show is participation in the audit is helping you achieve better results in other activities. That would be with your consent.

Other metrics we're looking at would be the amount of education resources that we put out there, and we'd also contact you to look at how the business network has impacted your ability to improve your biosecurity practises. We'd be doing surveys, and they'd be generally on how well you're doing and if you've seen an improvement. When we look at the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia and its promotion, we'll be looking at how well that's received in the community, and that can be done through social media posts. 

Looking at the program, though, it's not about certification or accreditation, but ultimately, we're in the co-design process as we move forward. So what works for business will be incorporated into the program, we'll be agile and make sure that the programme is best developed to meet the needs of business. Thank you, Philippe.

Philippe Frost: Thanks, Damien.

I guess off the back of that question, I think there was another question there about accreditation or certification. You've answered that. So, in the meantime, it is not that, but I guess, eventually could it become something like that?

Damien Jeffs: So, accreditation, no.

What we really need to focus on is the fact that this is an education programme. It's there to provide support or resources, and it's also a way to feed into the right people in the department. So, if there is a question, we have an internal working group where I can ask that question and it can be answered. The business network team won't be answering, but it's a conduit into the department. But ultimately, the focus is on awareness and education.

Thanks, Philippe.

Philippe Frost: That's great, thank you, Damien.

We have another one in the chat which has just come through. What kind of practical support or tools will be provided to help businesses and improve their biosecurity on the pledge, for example, templates, checklists, or self-assessment tools?

Damien Jeffs: Thanks, Philippe.

First off, the first product we'll be releasing is a CEO guide on how to manage biosecurity risk. We've developed that and we'll be looking to socialise it with our first biosecurity business network members to make sure it meets their needs and amend if necessary. As I said, we'll be agile to making sure the resources are best fit for our network members.

Then moving forward, we're working with the New Zealand Biosecurity Business Pledge. As I said before, we'll be working very closely with the New Zealand pledge team, but ultimately, we'll be engaging with our biosecurity business network members and finding out what is the most needed thing, and that will be our focus. But obviously, it's got to be practical, and our focus is on what would be beneficial. Thank you, Philippe.

Philippe Frost: Thank you, Damien.

Sorry, we had a couple of technical issues there, so you may have just got a little snippet of what Damien was saying. Our apologies. We do have a couple of issues in the system. I just want to say there is a shout out in the chat from Joe Darby at Biosecurity New Zealand. She wants to thank Debbie and Damien for their fantastic work and, you know, to have followed their journey over the last couple of months. Biosecurity New Zealand really value the pledge and the connected network, the opportunity to share learnings and opportunities and test new processes. So not only is this a thing that's happening in Australia, working together, it's also across a couple of countries and we're really sharing these learnings.

I'll just have a look if there are any further questions. Perhaps there's one more, we do have time for one more for Gayle. This is just a simple one, but who can actually join the Biosecurity business network?

Gayle Holmik: Thanks, Philippe. Hopefully I've unmuted myself.

Anyone can join. It's obviously very targeted for businesses to help them with particularly importing anything coming into the country to support their biosecurity requirements. We are going to be working very closely with our jurisdictional contacts and help to expand it across some of the state-based considerations as well, but really, it's open for anybody who's interested in joining and learning more information. If you would like to know more, just reach out to the team, and as I said, when you become part of that business network, we'll be actively engaging with you and you'll be helping to inform what activities we actually roll out for you and what sort of education activities and awareness we raise through the webinar, so you'll be guiding a little bit of that process for us as well, working very much in partnership. Thanks, Philippe.

Philippe Frost: Thanks, Gayle.  We only have a couple of minutes left, so I think it is a good time to wrap that up. I would like to give a big thanks to our presenters for all of their insights, and a huge shout out to Debbie and all of our New Zealand colleagues for joining us today.

For everyone online, I'd like to thank you as well for joining us to hear about this fantastic engagement and education programme that our team at DAFF and also across the ditch—we will all closely together with business to shape. I encourage you to visit biosecurity.gov.au/pledge to take the pledge, read a little bit about it, sign up and join a network of like-minded businesses who will be committed to enhancing their biosecurity practises for a safer future. Together we can all make a meaningful difference towards a resilient future for Australia.

Thank you all for joining us today. From the team here at DAFF, we will definitely be in touch, and we look forward to seeing many, many of you join the Pledge. So have a lovely week and lovely weekend, and we will see you soon.

[Webinar ends]

(Duration 47 mins)

23 July 2026

[Webinar begins]

Thank you everyone, we'll wait one minute before commencing.

Good afternoon everyone and thank you for joining us for the July Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia members webinar. My name is Damien Jeffs and I'm the manager of the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia programme at the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry.

I will be facilitating today's session. It's great to see so many representatives from across industry, business and government joining us today. This is our third webinar for the year and I'm pleased to see so many returning members as well as those joining for the first time.

For those that have taken the pledge already, thank you. And for those that haven't, it's an easy process and can be done by completing the web form on our website located at www.biosecurity.gov.au/pledge.

Today's webinar is being recorded and will be made available on our website following the session. Before we begin, I would like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land we are joining from today and pay my respects to elders past and present.

I also extend that respect to any Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander peoples with us today.

Today's webinar continues our focus on providing practical information that businesses can apply to strengthen biosecurity across their operations and supply chains.

We are pleased to be joined by Caryn Scott, Director of the Hitchhiker and Non-First Points Cargo Policy Section at the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. Caryn leads national policy relating to Hitchhiker Pest, specifically BMSB. Today,
Caryn will provide an overview of the 2025-26 brown marmorated stink bug season, including target and emerging risk countries, high-risk goods, approved treatment options, and some scenarios for most commonly encountered situations throughout the season.

Following Caryn's presentation, we'll be joined by Harrison Osborne, Manager of Project Planning and Policy at Biosecurity Tasmania. Harrison is part of the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia team and will provide an update on the National Biosecurity Week and discuss how Biosecurity Business Pledge members can get involved in promoting biosecurity through your own organisations to your customers and to your supply chains. We will then move into a question and answer session. If you have any questions for Caryn or Harry, please submit them in the question and answer function throughout the webinar. And now, I'll hand over to Caryn. Thank you, Caryn.

Thank you. Sorry, I was just trying to find the unmute button.

Thanks for the introduction, Damien. As mentioned, my name is Caryn Scott and I am the Director for the Hitchhiker and Non-First Points Cargo Policy. Today, my presentation will basically give us an overview of the BMSB seasonal measures and specifically as to why we don't actually want these in our country.

So BMSB, this is a quick picture of what they do look like. As you can see, they come in many different forms, just depending on at what stage of their life cycle they are at. The most common form that we will most likely see will be the adults which are around 12 to 17 millimetres long and have a mottled appearance with a reddish tinge. They are identified with two light bands near the end of the antennae and abdomen with black and white bands around the exposed edge. However, as you can see, the different little life cycles, there are about 28 in each batch. They're about greenish, light green in colour and all the nymphs when hatched will actually stay close to where the eggs are. Thank you.

Now, BMSB, they are native to North Asia, which includes China, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea. Now, because of the hitchhiking nature of these pests, they are now found in a range of countries across the northern hemisphere, including North America, so USA, was one of the main countries that they first established in, Canada, and are rapidly spreading across Europe, Italy being the main country.

Where BMSB is however native, their numbers are controlled due to having natural predators and historical farming practises which help keep their populations in balance. Now both Australia and New Zealand are free of BMSB and we are both watching and hoping to learn from other nations that have experienced the invasion of BMSB. Now, to manage the risk of BMSB, Australia implements controls at the pre-border, at the border and post-border.

Again, why are we looking at BMSB? So they are a major agriculture pest. They are ranked currently number 9 in the National Priority Plant Pest List. Now try and say that fast 100 times. And it's also listed in the Exotic Environmental Pest List. BMSB are not fussy in what they like to eat. Known to feed on around 300 species, unlike a lot of our native stink bugs that are just, you know, will target only specific plant species. BMSB have been known to cause millions of dollars in damage to industries overseas. For example, in the USA, in the first few years, they did devastate the apple industry over there, causing millions of dollars in damage. In Georgia, the hazelnut was what was hit. It used to be number one on Georgia's export list and because of the damage caused by BMSB, it did drop to number 3. Now, they're not only just a pest to agriculture, but also to people. If you have a look at that middle photo, coming up to winter, they will enter homes and aggregate in huge numbers.

So another example, if you have, when you find the time, there's a QR code which will show the impact that they do have on the homes and people in the USA. Now, if any exotic species, which includes BMSB, becomes established, they would cause significant damage to our environment, which includes our unique native plants, animals and our First Nations heritage sites. You know, we're having to use pesticides and other controls to keep these numbers down. Historically, our biosecurity systems were built to manage and limit threats that evolve slowly or not at all. However, now we face multiple threats on multiple fronts, including from our near north. Currently, FMD, sorry, foot and mouth disease, Varroa mite, lumpy skin disease, bird flu, would be some of the current threats you would have also heard about.
Now, this makes it more important that our border and import controls are held strong and adhered to, and the department requires everyone to play their part.
Thank you, Kristina.

So just a quick overview, the BMSB seasonal measures, these measures apply to goods shipped between 1 September and 30 April, which are shipped as Sea Cargo. Now any target high risk goods or target risk goods manufactured in or shipped from a target risk country will be subject to these measures. Now, the risk season, 1 September to 30 April is when BMSB in the northern hemisphere, are starting to actually go and find a place to hide and aggregate in those large numbers. So in the northern hemisphere, they're looking for machinery, whatever's normally stored outside. They'll go and hide in these little nooks and crannies. Then the exporters will pack them in the containers or put them into a container, ship them over here. They'll come into Australia. So from their winter, to a nice warm Australian summer where they'll actually wake up, go, ah, nice and warm, and they'll go out searching for food. And then once they're nice and happy and full, they will seek to then reproduce. So that's why we've got that specific time period of 1 September to 30 April. So just to reiterate, any target high risk goods will require mandatory treatment. Any goods listed as target risk are only subject to random inspections. Now, these measures also apply to any vessels. So any vessels that berth at ports will transit their goods from these target high risk countries. They'll be subject to heightened vessel surveillance.

Now, we currently have four countries, the UK, China, Japan, and Republic of Korea. Now, these are listed as emerging risk countries only, and goods coming from these countries will be subject to random inspections. We also have random inspections for air freight goods from the USA and China.

Just a quick overview of our stats from last season. As you can see, we had a total of just under 82,000 entries coming into Australia that were referred for BMSB. Of those 58 consignments that we had come through, we did direct 58 of those for export as they were non-compliant with our BMSB measures. So when I say export, this mainly relates to our break bulk goods, which are subject to mandatory offshore treatments. We did have a total of 254 detections last season of BMSB. So that includes both dead and alive at both at our border and post border. In addition, while yellow spotted stink bug is not subject to the seasonal measures, the department is keeping track of these detections. Hence why we've got the numbers up there. So we did intervene on 156 of these Pest last season.

Next slide, please.
So that's just a quick overview of the target risk countries that their goods are subject to intervention for BMSB. So there are currently 38 target high risk countries and three countries subject to the heightened vessel surveillance.

Next slide. Thank you.
As mentioned before, the department has recognised that the UK, China, Japan and Republic of Korea as emerging risk countries only. So only target high risk goods with the addition of chapters 39, 94 and 95 that are manufactured in and shipped from these countries will be subject to random inspections only. So no treatment is required for goods coming from these countries. But however, if the goods were manufactured in a target high-risk country, shipped to one of these emerging risk countries for export, they will be subject to the BMSB seasonal measures, including mandatory treatment if they were shipped within season. Again, this is a quick overview of the BMSB high risk goods and target risk goods. So there are 23 chapters listed as target high risk, which are subject to mandatory treatment, and 9 chapters which are listed as risk goods. These are only subject to random inspections. However, if you had any risk goods packed in with the target high risk goods, they too will be subject to mandatory treatments because we manage all the containers at the highest risk level due to possible cross-contamination.
Thank you. Next slide.

Now, this season, we have 4 approved BMSB treatment types, methyl bromide,
sulfuryl fluoride, heat treatment and ethyl formate, which actually came into use for BMSB last season for offshore treatment. However, this season, we have approved ethyl formate for onshore use as well. Now, all treatment providers, in a target risk country that intends to conduct BMSB treatment must register under our AusTreat system. So they have to be a registered treatment provider to perform these treatments for BMSB.

Any queries relating to Offshore Treatments registrations, their methodologies and approvals, please send them to offshoretreatments@aff.gov.au. For onshore treatment, the approved arrangement classes that do support the onshore treatment of BMSB are our 12.1 for the methyl bromide, 12.2 for the sulfuryl fluoride, 12.3 for heat treatment and 12.4 for ethyl formate. So our 12.4 is new for this season. We also do have an additional class 4.7 AA, which allows a secure unpack where containers are packed too tightly to allow in-container fumigation. So this AA class basically allows for the container to be unpacked in a secure environment for treatment to occur.Thank you. Next slide.

Just highlighting a few common scenarios that our team see every season that has led to additional treatment or in some cases export because clients or importers are not aware of these scenarios. Now, the first one is the supply samples. We see this especially coming up to the Christmas holiday period. This is where free samples are added in to non-target risk goods by the supplier or the exporter. For example, you know, you see this picture of all the cheese and ham, which we had one year. The supplier decided to add in a couple of metal champagne buckets, some knives, etc., which were all target high risk stuff, which meant that the entire container was then subject to treatment. So please be aware, free samples are not exempt. If they are deemed as target high risk, it would then mean the whole container would be subject to mandatory treatment. One way to get around this is either remove the samples, advise the supplier not to add these in, or treat the samples prior to packing it into the container. The second scenario is modified containers. We find these declared a lot as a full container load. However, we deem modified containers as break bulk. Now, break bulk, any goods being imported as break bulk have to be treated offshore prior to importation into Australia. They cannot be treated onshore. So if your container is modified in any way, please ensure that they are treated offshore prior to coming into Australia. A third common scenario is unaccompanied personal effects. Now, some personal effects may be treated differently. However, goods cleared under the ABF approved form B534 may not need mandatory BMSB treatment. Where there are motorcycles, motorbikes, vehicles and goods that have to be reported on a full import declaration, they will be subject to the BMSB measures and if they are vehicles, for example, mandatory treatment will be required.

The last scenario is goods shipped from New Zealand. People automatically assume, because New Zealand has BMSB measures in place, that if they do first go into New Zealand and then arrive here, they will be exempt for treatment. Please note that while they do have measures in place, we do not target the same goods. So certain goods that we do deem to require treatment, New Zealand may not, for example. So if they are going to New Zealand first and then coming here, please check to see if treatment is required so you're not subject to onshore treatment and extra costs. Or, in some cases, for as break bulk directed for export.
Thank you. Next slide.

So based on what I've said, just some quick tips here to how you can prepare for the BMSB season, just avoid any delays or even extra costs, or even avoiding your goods being exported altogether. So plan your shipments early, confirm what goods are in scope for the BMSB measures, especially at the start of each season. You know, depending on the assessment from previous years, certain conditions may change slightly. So check if your goods require treatment prior to arrival. As mentioned, break bulk, flat racks and open tops, and modified containers are subject to mandatory offshore treatment. Plan your shipping route. Goods transiting via target risk country may also be subject to BMSB measures. So if you're coming from a non-target risk country, they're coming in by a target risk country. So USA, for example, if they're not in a sealed 6 hard sided container, they're going to be unpacked or they're coming in trans shipping as brake bulk, and they will be in that country for more than five days, they will be subject to mandatory treatment. So just ensure that you are aware of your shipping route.

Next one is to treat and pack correctly. Treatments must be completed by an approved provider with compliance certificates in a target risk country. If you are getting them treated in a non-target risk country, you do not have to use an approved treatment provider, but this is always recommended as they are aware of our certification requirements and they have been approved because they know how to treat to the BMSB standards. We have had instances in the past where someone's used an unapproved provider, they've used the wrong fumigant, and we've had to export the goods.

Now, next one is to build post-treatment timeframes into your shipping plans. Goods treated in a target risk country must meet these post-treatment sealing and loading requirements. So what that means is there is a 120 hour window from when the goods have been treated to when they must be sealed in a container, if they are in a six hard sided container, or shipped on board a vessel if they are shipped as brake bulk.

The third is to avoid high shipping configurations where possible. So mixed cargo is managed at the highest risk level and cannot be deconsolidated if treatment of that container is required. As I stated earlier, if you are mixing your containers, treat the high-risk goods separately, then pack it into the rest of the container, or don't mix it all.

Now for document and time allowance, all documents must clearly link to the consignment, so it must meet our minimum document policy. Goods transiting through a target risk country may become subject to the measures and always allow time for onshore inspection and intervention. We do not provide any exemptions or remove random verification inspections where required. It is a requirement of importation under the BMSB seasonal measures.
Next slide, please.

Now, finally, just to say, you know, we all have a part to play in keeping this pest outside because it affects us all. Higher grocery prices, they're just a pest when they come indoors. However, if you look at that QR code, chickens do like the taste of them. But we really don't want to see this because it can also affect our export industry and not just importation. So, you know, see secure report is what we commonly say, working together with your offshore suppliers to manage not just the BMSB risk, but all biosecurity Pest risks overall. Please stay updated on the BMSB seasonal measures by visiting our webpage as per the link there. The other recommendation is please subscribe to our import industry advice notices to get updates of any changes to import requirements. So not just our BMSB measures, but all of our biosecurity measures are coming on there. We do recommend watching the webinar, managing the risk of a serious hitchhiker pest, as per the link below. If you do have any questions on the BMSB seasonal measures, you can contact my team at hpp@aff.gov.au. Apologies, I actually forgot to put that email on that slide. Next slide, I think there's one more, maybe. No, that's it. Thank you all.

Thank you, Caryn. That was an excellent overview of the BMSB risk season. The presentation highlights how important it is for business involved in importing, logistics and supply chains to understand emerging biosecurity risks and work proactively to reduce them.

One of the objectives of the biosecurity Business Pledge Australia program is to connect businesses with practical information like today's presentation, helping members strengthen biosecurity awareness across their operations. I would now like to hand over to Harrison Osborne for our National Biosecurity Week update over to you, Harry.

Thanks, Damien, and thanks, Caryn. That was a great presentation. It brought me back to the start of my career in biosecurity as an inspector, carrying out some of those vessel inspections and container inspections. So that was cool to revisit. Thanks.

My name's Harrison and I work for Biosecurity Tasmania and I've been working really closely with Damien and the team on the Biosecurity Business Pledge. And it's my pleasure today to talk to you all about the National Biosecurity Week for 2026. So I'm just going to cover a couple of things today.

Many of you online may not have even been aware that we have a National Biosecurity Week, so I'll talk a little bit about what it is and how it started, some of the general aims for this event week, and what we're hoping to achieve, and I'll round it out with how you can get involved for this year.

So what is it? National Biosecurity Week, it's an initiative that we started a couple years ago with the aim to really shine a bit of a light on how important biosecurity is in protecting our environment, our agricultural industries, our food supply and economy, but also importantly, our Australian communities and our way of life, how we live. It runs each year in mid to late August, and it really is an opportunity for everyone, government, industry, and communities, to talk about the importance of biosecurity, what it means for them, and the impacts that it can have. So each year we try and have a slightly different focus and this year for 2026 we're really looking at trying to increase the profile of biosecurity as a concept and what our biosecurity system looks like and what some of the important roles within that system are.
So it's about building awareness of biosecurity, starting conversations, having it become more of a household term beyond industry, agricultural industries are well aware of biosecurity and the important role it plays, but we want communities to start to take that same view, so we're trying to build that awareness and encourage people to consider how they can be part of a more integrated and effective biosecurity system. I pulled this little image off of the website where a lot of people think biosecurity means border control and hazmat suits, or in my case in Tasmania, whenever I say I work for Biosecurity Tasmania. The next question is, oh, do you get to work with a dog at the airport? But biosecurity is so much more than that. It's all about protecting the things that we love and protecting how we live. And so that's what National Biosecurity Week is really trying to achieve, it is to demystify that understanding of biosecurity.

So how did it start? Our first Biosecurity National Biosecurity Week was back in 2024.
And we managed to line that up with the third Australian Biosecurity Symposium in Queensland. That graphic on the slide there is from the symposium. There's an incredible artist that's attended the last two symposiums called Jessamy Gee, and she sits off to the side of the stage during the sessions and does these live sketches of the conversation and really captures the spirit of what the discussion was. And this is what came out of the session on Biosecurity Week at that symposium. It was our first one. The concept started quite small, like many of these sort of week-long events do, but we're building upon the profile of it each year and really looking forward to continuing to build on it this year for 2026.

So, next slide, thank you.
Like I said, the concept started quite small. It was an idea that came out of the National Biosecurity Communications and Engagement Network. That's a group of biosecurity communication professionals from every jurisdiction, as well as some key partner organisations like Plant Health Australia, Animal Health Australia and CSIRO. Wildlife Health Australia and the Invasive Species Council are also part of that national communication network. We, through that group, identified a need to really highlight and celebrate the idea of our shared responsibility towards biosecurity, both across government, industry and communities, and celebrate that in a way that was meaningful and had visibility and increased awareness of the important role that biosecurity has for us all. We decided we wanted to be a little bit greedy and go for a week instead of just a day.
We thought a week just gave us much more opportunity for people to get involved, whether they wanted to run events or have a social media campaign or an internal competition with staff or anything. A week just gave us much more flexibility to really make the most of this and celebrate all the amazing things that happen across the country related to biosecurity.
And then finally, our approach was very simple. We just wanted to start. We could have done a lot of planning for the first one and tried to have all of these events and presentations, but we thought these things take time. An example that we drew on was National Science Week. It took nearly 10 years for that Science Week to really reach its peak and have the awareness and reach that it does today. So we just wanted to get stuck into it, do the first one, and continue to build each year from there. So what does it help us achieve? I've talked a little bit about this already, but it's twofold. It's about raising awareness of good biosecurity practises with our communities and with people that might not necessarily understand biosecurity or our biosecurity system very well. And that helps us, that greater understanding helps us maintain our trade partnerships. It helps prevent the spread of pests and diseases. It can also, by educating our communities, it can help improve our environments and our public spaces and our food safety and security as well.
But at more of an industry level, as much of you will be aware, biosecurity underpins a lot of our success for our agricultural industries, you know, producing $94 billion annually, exporting $68 billion in premium goods. Good biosecurity practises underpin that boost to the economy. And so by celebrating our system and our wins and working together, we can help to increase that even more, I think it also provides an opportunity for us to all participate in that engagement, whether it's with our internal staff, our stakeholders, our customers, our families at the dinner table. More conversations means better biosecurity outcomes for Australia.

So, how can you get involved?
Like I've said on the slide there, look, small actions can make a really big difference. And that's what the pledge is really all about. So as a member of the pledge, or look, I think we have over 150 people online today, which is amazing. So hopefully there'll be some more people willing to jump on board and take the pledge after today.
But as a member of this Biosecurity Business Network, you can assess your current operational practices, try and identify any risks or things that could be improved, and then start to make those small changes. Those small changes really do have a big impact. And importantly, proactive measures really help to prevent the spread of pests and diseases. If any of you online today attended some of our earlier webinars, we talked about the invasion curve. I won't get into it at the moment, but time and money invested in proactive biosecurity measures has a huge return on investment compared to reactive biosecurity measures. So responding to a pest detection or incursion can be much more costly. So having a think about what proactive measures you can put in place is really beneficial. But if there is a biosecurity incident or an event, and it results in the detection of something. Early reporting or reporting anything unusual is also really important. So being aware of what to look out for in your certain operation or industry and making sure you report early can be a huge, huge advantage. We had a little tag line here to maybe help contextualise this proactive planning and reporting of clean it, check it, report it, and respect it. And the respect is in relation to our biosecurity system and wanting to improve that and have really good biosecurity measures in place. So the nitty gritty of it all for this year, it's going to be the 24th to the 30th of August, which is only about a month away. It's going to be our third National Biosecurity Week, which is really exciting. So I think we're starting to find some of that momentum with this and you can help us push that even more. Planning for this year is well underway and only last week there were some resources sent out to stakeholders for this year's National Biosecurity Week. We are also going to be developing some materials that will be specific for our pledge members to use. So again, if you're not a member and would like to be involved and would like to receive some of those materials, you've got a month to jump on it. But yeah, we're going to develop some social media content and some other resources that our members can use to promote National Biosecurity Week. And another great way that you can get involved is on the National Biosecurity Week website. There's actually a space there to register any events or conferences. So if by chance you have anything that falls within that week, or even if you wanted to plan something, you can actually get that promoted on the webpage and there's a few up there already which is really great to see.

So for more information, I've mentioned their website just there. So there's the link. For our members, keep an eye out for those resources that will create and get sent your way. And look, it really is still in that building phase, like I said. So we're really excited to be holding this for the third time, and we're keen to work with industries and communities to push the profile of National Biosecurity Week even further. Please do reach out if you have any questions or any great ideas for how you might be able to help out or be involved. Thank you very much. I'll hand back to Damien.

Thanks, Harrison. National Biosecurity Week is a great reminder that biosecurity is a shared responsibility. For Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia members, it's also an opportunity to demonstrate leadership by promoting biosecurity messages within your organisations and your supply chains. Whether that's sharing information with staff, customers, or suppliers, every conversation helps strengthen Australia's biosecurity culture. We will now move into our Q&A session with the remaining time. And our first question is for Caryn. If BMSB is native to Northeast Asia, curious to understand how come imports from these countries are not subject to mandatory treatment or not classified as high risk?

Thanks, Damien. That's a good question. So as mentioned in one of the previous slides, now, these data-free countries, BMSB actually have natural predators which feed on BMSB. So one of the examples of these natural predators is the samurai wasp. That, combined with the historical farming practises that they put in place to naturally control these pests, keep their numbers low. However, we are keeping a close eye, hence why we still have interventions, not mandatory treatments, but random inspections and heightened vessel surveillance is in place for finding high numbers of live BMSB coming through on this cargo. If we do see these start to increase, we will potentially in the future add them as a target risk country for mandatory treatment. Just for an example, the BMSB measures started back in about 2014, where it was just USA. Having a look at the figures, looking at the way that BMSB have been expanding to other countries and are invading these countries, Italy was then added in 2018 and now we have 38 target high risk countries. So we are keeping an eye on detection numbers as they come in on our cargo each season, and we will make changes to manage these risks. Thank you, Damien.

Thanks, Caryn. And Caryn, I have another follow-up question. With regards to modified containers, example battery storage bank containers for solar farms classified to Chapter 85, confirming that these need offshore treatment.

Yes, so that's correct. So Chapter 85 is deemed to be a target high risk good, so subject to mandatory treatment, as these are modified containers, they are deemed to be break bulk, therefore mandatory offshore treatment will be required for these goods.

Thanks Caryn. And our next question may be answered by Candice in our team, with regards to UPE, often vehicles have been unpacked by the time an FID is being created after being checked by ABF and DAFF. This means that in-container treatment is not going to be available, may have already been inspected by DAFF, but UPE status denied by ABA fumigation as unpacked cargo. Is this going to be allowed? Welcome, Candice Somerville, also part of DAFF.

Thanks, Damien. Good afternoon, everyone. For everyone's benefit, my name is Candice Somerville. I'm the Assistant Director working with Caryn with the BMSB seasonal measures. So in relation to UPEs, we know that it can be, it can get quite complicated. So the general rule of thumb is not to have your goods unpacked until you've got that AVF approval that your goods actually meet the UPE requirements and can be cleared under that Chapter 99. Typically, what we find is that most vehicles, including cars and motorcycles, won't be approved to be cleared under the UPE Chapter 99 status. So it's best just to keep those goods packed in their original container until you've got that finalised result. And that will then speed up the process of having your treatment in that one container, all the other goods treated in one, versus potentially having follow on delays with the whole container once it's unpacked and then being repacked into a container or fumigation chamber for fumigation. There will be no exemptions. So, on the off chance that something has been unpacked, you will then need to have the whole container or the contents of that original container fumigated regardless. So it just delays the process. So for anyone bringing in UPEs, definitely email us at hpp@aff.gov.au and we can help you work through those scenarios where you can best stream line those transitions in UPA practices.

Thank you, Candice. And now we've got time for one more question. So Harry, I'll ask one on Biosecurity Week that came in. How can businesses get involved in National Biosecurity Week?

Thanks, Damien. Like I mentioned earlier, we will be providing a suite of resources and comms materials that you can use, but also don't feel limited to only using that content we're producing. On the website for National Biosecurity Week, there's already some resources up there, which you're welcome to use. So if you wanted to do your own social media posts, or a great opportunity would even be to do some internal messaging with staff or customers to start those conversations about Biosecurity National Biosecurity Week. It really is just, it's a good opportunity for businesses to showcase what biosecurity practises you already have in place. So if you would like to wait for those resources we're creating, by all means, but you are very welcome to run with it as well and develop some of your own materials, get creative with it, and even get involved in the space that I mentioned on their website where they have events listed. Have a look, there might be something nearby that you can get involved in as well. So, that's probably my advice. A good place to start is the National Biosecurity website and the resources that we'll send you away for members.

Thanks, Harrison.

Well, that brings us to the end of today's webinar. Thank you again, Caryn and Harrison, for sharing your expertise with us. If you have any further questions about the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia, please contact us at bbn@aff.gov.au.

You will also find today's presentation, webinar recordings and additional information on the Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia website, which can be found at www.biosecurity.gov.au/pledge.

We are limiting some future resources to members, so if you haven't taken the pledge, I will also take this opportunity to encourage you to do so by visiting the website and completing that simple web form. We'd also ask that you provide your logo so we can help promote your company on that website. So thank you again for joining us and we look forward to our next Biosecurity Business Pledge Australia Members webinar. Thank you.

[Webinar ends]