Gawler River Tomatoes owner Harry Kapiris has thrown out at least $1.1 million worth of tomatoes and laid off 30 workers over the past week, after a highly-transmissible virus was detected in South Australia last month.
Tomato brown rugose fruit virus has been detected in SA and on Wednesday, the state government issued a complete ban on stock leaving three Adelaide Plains farms in a bid to eradicate it.
68-year-old Mr Kapiris told The Advertiser he made the “difficult decision” to cut his losses last week, with four states completely turning away fruit from positive sites.
Mr Kapiris was unable to fulfil this season’s contracts and said the true cost of the quarantine could run into the $3-4 million mark.
While Mr Kapiris was not against the state government’s decision, he said compensation should be offered.
“At the end of the day, what happened to us wasn’t our fault,” he said.
“The biosecurity authorities are supposed to screen the seedlings that come in from overseas, so it looks like a bad batch has come through.”
Source: The Advertiser
