The Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment has installed state-of-the-art technology that will allow it to automatically detect fruit, vegetables, meat, seafood and plant material being brought across the Australian border.
Minister for Agriculture, David Littleproud said 3D x-ray units had been installed at Melbourne airport and mail gateway centres in Sydney and Melbourne providing them with the world’s first biosecurity risk auto-detection algorithms, designed by the Department to target Australia’s highest biosecurity risks.
“The 3D x-rays are allowing biosecurity officers to do their work more effectively and efficiently and will help streamline the passenger, air cargo and mail pathways into Australia,” Mr Littleproud said.
“Our clean green reputation makes Australian produce valued overseas and we have to protect that,” he said.
“During 2020, 78 million international mail articles arrived into Australia and over 72 thousand mail articles were identified to contain actionable biosecurity risk material.”
Mr Littleproud said biosecurity risks would continue to increase as the volume of goods entering Australia was expected to double between 2015 and 2030.
“Since their deployment in 2019 the 3D x-rays have successfully increased the rate of detections of biosecurity risk items by double at Melbourne airport and triple at the Melbourne mail centre,” the Minister said.
He said several ‘spin-off’ projects had also been engaged to manage emerging risks, including a specific X-ray unit for seed detection.
“Seeds make up approximately 80 per cent of all detections in the mail pathway and could potentially be an invasive species or carry plant diseases that could threaten backyard gardens, agriculture industries and the environment,” Mr Littleproud said.
