A farmer whose operation was impacted by the response to Australia’s largest avian influenza outbreak is warning of more frequent outbreaks and egg shortages.
In the final days of 2024, quarantine restrictions were lifted on the last property impacted by the state’s outbreak, bringing an end to Australia’s largest-ever avian influenza outbreak.
The outbreak began on an egg farm near Meredith in May 2024 and spread to eight farms across south-west Victoria.
Seven infected properties near Meredith were confirmed to have a high pathogenicity H7N3 strain of avian influenza, and one infected property near Terang was found to have a high pathogenicity H7N9 strain.
Quarantine measures have now been lifted on the last of the infected Victorian poultry properties, but a Victorian egg farmer is predicting more outbreaks more often as the industry shifts away from cage eggs.
Fears of more outbreaks
Victorian egg farmer Wes Humpage said he was disappointed with how the outbreak was managed and called for change.
“The department failed to work with industry to identify the risk on each farm,” Mr Humpage said.
Wes Humpage limits chickens to 450 per hectare on his egg farm. (Supplied: Wes Humpage)
“They just had this blanket rule and they stopped all egg movement — continue buying all your goods and pay your staff, but you’re not allowed to sell your product and store it all.
“What they were asking was completely unachievable.”
Mr Humpage said more consultation would have led to more sustainable solutions for a fraction of the cost.
“One of the first things that they should have done is provide funding for high-risk farms to put in a vehicle wash for all trucks entering,” he said.
Mr Humpage limits chickens to 450 per hectare on his egg farm, and was concerned disease outbreaks in the poultry industry would become more frequent as the state achieved its goal to move away from caged eggs by 2036.
“Ten thousand birds per hectare is the sort of free range we’re talking about — inevitably you’re exposing these birds to the outside world in an uncontrolled environment and with such high stocking density, it’s really easy for disease to come through,” Mr Humpage said.
“That will have material impact on the industry and a lot of this is being brought about by shutting down these cage systems.”
But President of the Victorian Farmers Federation egg group Meg Parkinson did not believe stocking density made any difference.
Meg Parkinson says disease can be spread when people fail to clean their boots before entering sheds. (Supplied: Meg Parkinson)
“What happens is people walk around paddocks, get duck droppings on their boots, don’t clean their boots before they go in the shed, and that spreads the disease,” Ms Parkinson said.
“It can also spread on the air, but it takes a lot longer to spread throughout the shed — that can happen in cage or free-range sheds.”
Looking ahead
Ms Parkinson said the government’s response to the outbreak “wasn’t bad” but improvements could always be made.
“I would like to see the clean-up move faster,” she said.
“The longer it takes to clean up, the longer before birds can be back in their sheds — so that’s the key to getting the system working as quickly as possible.”
Ms Parkinson said if farmers could do the clean-up themselves, it could speed up the process and get eggs back on shelves faster.
“They do it every year, they’ve got the equipment or they know the contractors who have the equipment,” she said.
“The difficulty that government has is that they’re bound by a whole lot of regulations that when you’re cleaning up your farm you don’t have to do.
“So it takes them longer than it would a farmer to do the same job.”
More than a million birds killed
Agriculture Victoria said 1.3 million birds were killed across eight Victorian properties to prevent the spread of the two high pathogenicity bird flu strains.
The number of deaths was more than double the state’s last outbreak in 2020, which resulted in the death of over 400,000 birds, including emus, turkeys, and chickens.
Meredith egg farm was quarantined in 2024. (ABC News: Rochelle Kirkham)
Victoria’s acting chief veterinary officer Cameron Bell said the two Victorian strains had been successfully eradicated.
“Victoria’s response included undertaking extensive surveillance with testing of 38,000 birds taking place,” Dr Bell said.
“The collaborative efforts of government, the chicken meat and egg industries, and the community have ensured that we could respond effectively to the outbreak.”
The outbreak contributed to egg shortages across the country with customers experiencing an “aftershock” from the deadly wave of the virus.
The state government urged all bird owners across Victoria to maintain good biosecurity practices, including keeping poultry sheds, yards, aviaries, and equipment clean, and excluding wild birds from feed and drinking water.
