Biosecurity New Zealand has temporarily suspended all Australian tomato imports, to be reviewed in seven days, after the detection of tomato brown rugose fruit virus at two South Australian growing properties earlier this week.

“We met this afternoon with our counterparts in Australia, where they provided an update on their work to respond to the detection of the tomato virus,” says Biosecurity New Zealand deputy director-general Stuart Anderson.

“Australia is taking steps to respond to the matter, including continuing to trace material. As this tracing work continues, and out of an abundance of caution, we are extending our restrictions by temporarily suspending imports of tomatoes from Australia. We will review this in seven days.

“This means temporary suspensions are now in place for tomato imports from all Australian states.”

Stuart Anderson says today’s decision builds on the urgent measures introduced by Biosecurity New Zealand earlier this week, which banned tomato imports from Australian states other than Queensland.

“All our imported tomatoes from Australia currently come from Queensland and not South Australia.

“So far tracing has not shown any affected material in Queensland, but we think it’s reasonable to be cautious while our counterparts continue their work.

“There is nothing to suggest the virus is here at present," says Stuart.

“We’ll continue to work closely with New Zealand’s tomato sector.

“As always we ask growers to check their biosecurity practices and be vigilant and contact us on our pests and diseases hotline (0800 80 99 66) if they notice problems with their tomatoes.

“We’ll continue to closely monitor the situation in South Australia and continue to take any actions to protect New Zealand growers.”

The virus affects causes yellowing and deformity in the host plants but has no impact on human health.

For more information please email: BiosecurityNZ_media@mpi.govt.nz