QUEENSLAND'S $600 million banana industry has called on the state Labor government to step up biosecurity measures immediately after the deadly Panama disease was detected at a second farm in the state's north.
The soil and water-borne Panama Tropical Race 4 fungus, which attacks and kills banana plants through the roots and vascular system, was found for the first time in north Queensland on March 3 at a farm in Tully Valley.
Last week a second commercial banana farm at Mareeba tested positive for the disease, prompting growers to demand a strict containment policy to protect Queensland from the disease that decimated the Northern Territory's nascent banana industry in the 1990s.
Australian Banana Growers Council (ABGC) chairman Doug Phillips said the identification of a second infected property was a serious blow.
"We had been hoping we'd contained it," he said.
"Containment measures are critical. Our advice to all growers is to ramp up on-farm biosecurity practices."
Mr Phillips, who grows bananas, said growers should eliminate movements of people and machinery on their properties as much as possible because the fungus could be transmitted by something as small as the soil on a pair of boots.
Mr Phillips and ABGC chief executive Jim Pekin met new Queensland Agriculture Minister Bill Byrne and officials from Biosecurity Queensland in Brisbane last Friday to ask for help.
The industry body wants minimum standards imposed by Biosecurity Queensland on infected farms before they restart operations and has requested funding assistance to destroy infected plants and fence-in infected farms.
The ABGC also wants a regulated program to clean banana planting material and a new research and development fund to research the TR4 Panama disease strain.
"We will try to do some work on other varieties that are more
resistant to the disease, but that is a longer-term strategy," Mr Phillips said.
"At the moment there is no other strategy than containment."
An estimated five million bananas are eaten in Australia every day.
It is Australia's biggest horticultural industry, with more than 90 per cent of production coming from northern Queensland.
About 500,000 cartons of bananas weighing 13 kilograms each are produced in northern Queensland every week. Australia does not import or export bananas.
Mr Phillips said the industry was by far the biggest employer in the region.
Panama disease is not dangerous to humans and does not infect the actual banana fruit.
The TR4 strain is particularly threatening for the industry because it can affect all varieties of bananas.
Once the spores are in the soil Panama disease can remain in the area for decades.