The 90 year ban on importing New Zealand apples into Australia was lifted in August of this year.
To a country which exports 60% of its agricultural output every year, it was feared that this could attack the profits of the local market (claims of losses up to $30 million per year), and of course, included the possibility of importing the dreaded ‘fire blight’ from New Zealand.
However, New Zealand called the ban a ‘barrier to trade’, and the claim was brought before the World Trade Organisation, which agreed with them.
Now, for the first time 90 years, we in Australia can now buy New Zealand apples.
However, it has not flowed smoothly. A shipment of NZ Apples was rejected in Tasmania due to quarantine regulations (small amounts of leaf matter were found in the shipment). A few red faces were revealed, but reassurance came via Bruce Beason, managing director of Apollo Apples, one of the major apple exporters in New Zealand, who chalked the situation up to ‘over reaction and scaremongering’.
One of the main reasons for the 90 year ban of NZ Apples comes down to fire blight, which was first discovered in NZ orchards in 1919. The disease gets into trees via lesions in the leaves and branches and can affect the entire tree. Hailstorms especially leave orchards susceptible to infection, and can help infect an entire orchard in mere minutes.
The disease leads to scorched looking leaves, like the tree has been affected by fire.
Hence, fire blight.
It can infect the entire tree if untreated, and it has been known to destroy entire orchards within one growing season. It is treated by various antibiotics, but this does not come without complications, as strains resistant to antibiotics have been found in the United States.
The history of fire blight is something like a cold sore on the face of the fruit export world.
Countries fiercely deny they have it, but then it turns out they do.
One such example is Japan, who claimed fire blight wasn’t present in their country and did not threaten their major fruit export; pears. When this was in fact deemed untrue, the scientist who discovered it there committed suicide over the shame of outing farmers who traded with blight-affected fruit. The Japanese government to this day, denies the existence of fire blight in Northern Japan.
For all the emphasis being placed on NZ Apples and the possibility of fire blight in Australia, not much fuss was made over the announcements of Chinese apple imports in January 2011.
China is the world’s leading apple grower, but has at least 18 ‘pests’ that appear on quarantine watch lists in Australia and no doubt prove much tougher to police than watching out for a few leaves and twigs.

By Chard Currie
Email: chard.currie@gmail.com

Source:
bloomberg.com
theaustralian.com
tvnz.co.nz