Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Manufacturing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The recent outbreak of hepatitis A, suspected of being linked to mixed berries imported from China, highlights both our vulnerability to the risks associated with food imports and the need for improvements in how those risks are managed. By comparison with other countries, Australia has a very good biosecurity system in place. But we would be naive to believe that our system is adequate or that it could not be improved.

Hepatitis A is a serious health issue. It could easily have been an even more serious health risk or a much wider break-out than the 18 cases already identified. Nor should we pretend that we were caught by surprise or that the outbreak was an isolated unforseen incident. Questions about Australia's biosecurity system have been raised frequently over the past decade, leading to Beale review in 2008. In recent years, the increased flow of goods, including foods, across the world has significantly elevated the biosecurity risks to Australia, threatening our health, our economy and our environment.

The costs to an affected individual and to the nation in responding to an outbreak of a disease are significant. If an outbreak occurs within the agricultural sector, the losses can run into the hundreds of millions of dollars and ruin Australian farmers, whose marketing advantage to date has been their clean, green image. Parallel with biosecurity arrangements is the right of consumers to protect themselves by having clear information about the country of origin of goods. Again, food labelling has been a longstanding matter of public debate. Nor are concerns about labelling confined to food products, as recently exposed by the importation of products containing asbestos.

Biosecurity and labelling concerns are not new and the public's patience in the failure of successive governments to act is wearing thin. Firstly, Australia's labelling laws should be made clearer. Secondly, country of origin labelling laws should fall within the jurisdiction of the ACCC as recommended in the Blewett review on food labelling. The origin of a product, including food, is a separate matter and has nothing to do with the nutritional and health information for which FSANZ is responsible.

The FSANZ process is cumbersome, requiring the approval of the Commonwealth, each of the states and territories and New Zealand. Thirdly, the biosecurity obligations placed on Australian food exporters, requiring product testing and certification should at the very least be applied equally to imported food products. It is not sufficient to simply hold food importers responsible for the quality of the food imported. It will be of little comfort for affected Australians to know they can take civil action against a food importer or retailer when a situation arises. Lastly, we need to ensure that our biosecurity agencies are adequately resourced and staffed. With cost recovery fee scales now in place there is no excuse for not carrying out more testing.