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The Victorian government proposed using prisoners to pick fruit on farms amid a worker shortage caused by international border restrictions, before the plan was immediately savaged by farmers and canned.
News of the unconventional solution to stop fruit rotting on trees comes as the Victorian Farmers Federation casts doubt on the viability of the Andrews governmentâs plan to bring 1500 Pacific Island workers into the state via Tasmania.
Fruit pickers in Victoria last month.
Credit:Justin McManus
After months of fevered deliberations over how to solve the industry crisis, Agriculture Victoria raised the possibility of using prison labour in a December 23 meeting with horticulture industry groups and the federal government.
Victorian Government accused of being too slow to adopt measures to keep activists off farms
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Three goats were removed from the Gippy Goat Cafe in 2018.
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Victorian farmers have accused the government of being slow at adopting new measures to keep activists off their properties and disrupting their trade.
Key points:
The report was tabled in state Parliament a year ago
None of the 15 recommendations have been fully implemented
The Victorian Government s Inquiry into the Impact of Animal Rights Activism on Victorian Agriculture report was tabled in state parliament on February 5, 2020.
The inquiry s chair, Labor MP Nazih Elasmar, said it was initiated in May 2019 after a series of events in 2018 and 2019 where animal rights intimidated farmers, stole livestock and disrupted businesses .
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An animal rights group has voiced concerns about a proposal to reintroduce dingoes into the Grampians, warning the native predators would be at risk of being poisoned or shot if found on private property.
A 15-year draft plan created by Parks Victoria and three groups of traditional owners to guide the management of the Grampians was released in November and contained a proposal to restore “locally extinct and culturally significant wildlife” such as the dingo and the quoll.
The proposal to reintroduce dingoes into the Grampians National Park has been fiercely opposed by local farmers.
Credit:Neil Newitt
It outlined a proposal to investigate, with farmers and academic institutions, whether the reintroduction of the native predator could “restore missing ecological processes” and control pest species as well as overabundant populations of kangaroos and wallabies.
A deal to fly in foreign workers to pick fruit in Victoria has been slammed as too little and too late by the federal government.
The interstate agreement means 1,500 Pacific Islands workers will fly in to Tasmania to undergo taxpayer-funded quarantine before they go onto Victoria to work.
The state s fruit-picking industry had been hit hard by Australia s border closure during the coronavirus pandemic - with an estimated $38million worth of produce already lost because of the strict travel restrictions.
Under the deal between Victoria and Tasmania, taxpayers will subsidise the quarantine of the foreign national workers in the first six months of 2021.