APL welcomes proposed amendments to the Biosecurity Act 2015 to strengthen biosecurity penalties, which was introduced into the House of Representatives last week.

Minister for Agriculture David Littleproud said the Biosecurity Amendment (Traveller Declarations and Other Measures) Bill 2020 reflected the need to be vigilant to protect Australia from an ever-increasing number of pests and diseases that threaten Australian agriculture.

“Diseases such as African swine fever would be devastating for our pork industry, as well as threaten our trade, environment and economy if there were an outbreak in Australia,” Mr Littleproud said.
“The Bill enables infringement notices with a higher value to be issued for goods that have not been declared on an incoming passenger card and pose a high biosecurity risk.”

The new legislation is expected to commence on 1 January 2021.

More information can be found on their website.