Pest animal and Weed Management Survey: National landholder survey results

Overview
Established pests and weeds represent a high ongoing cost to Australian agriculture. The Australian Government has invested $50 million through the Australian Competitiveness White Paper to improve the way pest animals and weeds are managed and to increase the capacity of farmers to deal with these threats. This is through investment in projects that: develop new and improved control tools and technologies; improve land manager awareness and access to control tools and technologies; improve land manager knowledge of best practice pest animal and weed management; and increase land manager and community participation in pest animal and weed management activities.

To enable the Department of Agriculture and Water Resources to evaluate outcomes of this investment, baseline data is required to provide a national overview of the status and management of established pest animals and weeds. Currently, there is insufficient data available to establish the baseline. Therefore a national survey of agricultural land managers was undertaken to collect data on pest animal and weed status, impacts and management actions at the property and local area levels.

This report presents the results of responses from 6470 agricultural land managers, representing broadacre, dairy, horticulture and other livestock industries across all natural resource management regions in Australia.

Key Issues
Nearly 80 per cent of respondents were actively managing a pest animal, and 85 per cent were actively managing weeds on their property in the last 12 months.

Shooting and ground baiting continue to be widely used tools for vertebrate pest management. Herbicide is used by 90 per cent of landholders in the management of weeds and reported as effective by the vast majority.

The majority of respondents reported that pest animal and weed control methods they were using were at least moderately effective.

Agricultural businesses spend a significant amount on managing pest animals and weeds. An average of $19,620 was spent per agricultural business on undertaking pest animal and weed management activities. This include pest animal and weed management related expenditure on traps, baits, herbicides, pesticides/insecticides, fuel, fencing materials, and labour (including the cost of contractors) on the property in the last 12 months. • For those managing pest animals they spend an average of $7,023 per year (pest animals including feral, natives, insects and other pests (for example, parasites and mites)). • Agricultural businesses spend an average of $17,917 per year on weed management activities, this includes all activities undertaken as part of the businesses’ usual production cycle activities, for example spraying weeds before planting a crop. Pest animal and weed control activities took an average of 77 person days per agricultural business by owners/operators (including family members) and 39 person days by contractors, employees and other people (for example, volunteers) in the last 12 months.

Nearly eight per cent of landholders were members of a pest animal or weed management group. The majority of the groups had developed a plan for coordinating management activities or collaborating with other stakeholders.

A majority of land managers reported: new and improved control methods; access to information on control options and methods; more management activities by other land managers (private and public); and better access to biological controls as important actions that could improve pest animal and weed management.