Farmers frustrated as locust control costs add up

Cropping farmers in north-west Victoria are increasingly concerned about a rapidly growing locust population.

Locusts began hatching in large numbers across the Mallee in mid-September due to warm and wet weather further north — ideal conditions for the insects to proliferate and travel south.

Jack Lambert, who farms at Meringur, west of Mildura, has seen bands of thousands of locusts hatch and move across his property and local national parks.

"We're running them down everywhere trying to stay on top of them," Mr Lambert said.

"I'm really worried. The talk of town is that we're going to have another plague, as we had 10 or 15 years ago."

Mr Lambert said that, despite repeatedly reporting locusts on his property through Agriculture Victoria's locust surveillance program, he had not heard from the department.

"It seems like they've put a real lot of work into making a show about finding locusts but where's the action?" he said.

"What support are we getting?

Highest levels in 15 years

Agriculture Victoria's locust surveillance program has been running since September but a spokesman said farmers should not expect help managing locusts on their properties.

"The responsibility for treatment of locusts is on the landholder or manager, whether that's private or public," Victoria's chief plant health officer Stephen Dibley said.

"You won't see Agriculture Victoria doing the treatment, but we will work with everyone we can to ensure that everyone is informed and can do the right treatment.

"There's a range of different government departments who will look after national parks or roadsides and we've been engaging actively with them for months about this to understand the risk."

He said that, according to the surveillance program, locust numbers were not at plague levels, but were at their highest levels in 15 years.

"All the information that we're collecting at the moment is not suggesting any further spread," Dr Dibley said.

"We're not expecting to see any high numbers really outside the Wimmera and Mallee."

Locust numbers 'pretty scary'

Jim Pickering also farms at Meringur, near Mr Lambert, and said the number of locusts he was seeing was "pretty scary".

"I'm very frustrated with the department," he said.

"A lot of my locusts are on the road reserves around my property.

"It's government land. They should be out here."

Mr Pickering said timing was crucial for locust control.

"When they start banding together you've got to act on it straight away," he said, adding there was a lot at stake for predicted record crop yields with harvesting starting in a few weeks.

Plea for support

In 2010, billions of locusts created a path of destruction from NSW to Victoria, making it to Melbourne and decimating broadacre and horticultural crops on the way.

It was the worst plague in 75 years and the state government responded by launching the Australian Plague Locust Response, which used biological and chemical controls to mitigate the impact on the agricultural sector.

In South Australia, locust spraying is subsidised by the state government through the Plague Locust Chemical Rebate, which offers up to $35 per hectare sprayed.

This year, the South Australian government announced a $6.5 million package broken into a $4.6 million chemical rebate scheme for landholders and a $1.9 million locust planning and surveillance program.

In Victoria, no such support is available.

Victoria Farmers Federation president Ryan Milgate said farmers should be compensated for their efforts, which are crucial to stopping the spread of the insects.

"They should be assisting landholders as well because they're ultimately doing this at their own cost of time and money," Mr Milgate said.

"Individual landholders are probably bearing more of the costs than they should."