Farmers have condemned Agriculture Victoria for neglecting biosecurity risks and their financial stability, after nearly $700,000 was cut from fruit fly management in the State Budget.

The Queensland fruit fly, declared an established pest in Victoria in 2014, lays larvae in fruit, rotting it from the inside. Fruit growers are forced to rely on costly pest control and chemical pesticides, and they risk losing international export deals due to biosecurity hazards.

The Victorian horticulture industry is the highest valued of any state in Australia, with fruit and nut production valued at $2.3 billion in 2024.

Over a near-10-year program, Agriculture Victoria invested $14.3 million to control fruit flies in the Goulburn Valley and surrounding areas—reducing the flies by 60 per cent across the Goulburn Valley region.

The program and funding was scheduled to cease next month.

Prior to the State Budget in May, advocacy from farmers and the Greater Shepparton City Council aimed to pressure Agriculture Victoria to renew the funding at $1 million yearly.

While farmers are usually capable of managing the pest on their own land, complications arise as residential areas like Shepparton or Cobram become breeding hotspots.

The program focused on educating the public on how to better manage their gardens and prevent breeding within greenery in public spaces.  

Greater Shepparton City Council business and industry leader Michael Carrafa said that with no permanent solution, state funding is essential to ensure fruit farms are viable businesses.

“We're asking for $1 million per annum from the Victorian Government to protect and safeguard $1.6 billion worth of output,” Carrafa said.

“Our area is the fruit bowl of Australia; it feeds the nation. It's important that those fruit growers are sustainable enough to be able to feed themselves.”

Agriculture Victoria relinquished attempts to cut the program entirely and its renewal was announced with the Budget.

Of the $20 million promised to safeguard Victoria from biosecurity risks, just $320,000 will be dedicated to the Queensland fruit fly management program.

Receiving a fraction of the funding they asked for, and no guarantee of any state support beyond this financial year, the council’s outrage continues.

Once a pest is deemed established, it is no longer regarded as a biosecurity threat by the Victorian Government and the burden of keeping it controlled rests on the landowner.

Carrafa said that the responsibility to educate the public on preventing the pest from germinating through backyard trees and public vegetation should not fall on farmers.

“There's unmanaged feral plants on public land, land owned by the Victorian Government,” Carrafa said.

“Fruit fly is breeding on their land and, of course, migrating to both the urban and the rural areas, causing significant difficulty for our fruit and vegetable growers."

A spokesperson for Victorian Minister for Agriculture Ros Spence said, in a written reply, discussions are ongoing about further support for the community but eradication is no longer a goal.

“We are backing the Goulburn Murray Valley, Sunraysia and Yarra Valley Queensland fruit fly [QFF] governance groups to design and deliver long-term QFF management programs,” the minister’s spokesperson said.

No explanation was given for the 70 per cent funding reduction or how the communities could be expected to regulate the pest breeding in urban communities if funding is phased out.

Fruit Growers Victoria grower services manager Michael Crisera said initially the program brought significant relief, but that steadily declined over time.

“When it was funded at its peak, we had funding to pay field officers, as well as sterile insect releases,” Crisera said.

With limited funding, Crisera said services such as removing unwanted trees from the backyards of the elderly or those without time to garden have halted.

Crisera said the most helpful thing Agriculture Victoria could do would be open a sterile insect release centre. The eggs of sterile fruit flies do not develop into larvae, reducing the loss of produce and further reproduction.

The sterile fruit fly technique has been successful in trials in Cobram and is widely used in South Australia.

“They need to help fund area-wide management for the urban areas,” Crisera said.

“To just pull the funding, what they're doing now, is really a huge backward step.”

Carrafa said if there were no program controlling fruit fly numbers, “there could be an increase of over 600 per cent”, based on a study commissioned by Greater Shepparton City Council.

He said that the council aims to utilise the $320,000 resourcefully, but that it will struggle without the full $1 million.

South Australia is now the only mainland Australian state where the Queensland fruit fly is not established.

Fruit Producers South Australia chief executive Grant Piggot said he worries the Victorian funding cut could cause more outbreaks in South Australia.

“If it suddenly became much more out of control in Victoria, we’d be much more vulnerable to losing the fight here,” Piggot said.