Bee sites
Melina BATH (Eastern Victoria) (18:34): (1946) My adjournment matter this evening is for the Minister for Environment, and it regards the planned cancellation of longstanding bee sites on public land by Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action staff. Professional beekeepers have been given notice, such as from Parks Victoria at Wilsons Promontory, who stated that no further and future applications will be supported and existing licences will not be renewed. This is in direct contradiction to the state government’s own apiculture on public land policy – and you can look it up online; it exists now – which clearly states its commitment to encourage and support apiculture on public land, recognising the honey bees’ vital role in food security, regional jobs and in agricultural exports. Seventy-five per cent of our agricultural products in this state require pollination through bees. This policy also aims to maximise the coexistence of other land uses, streamlining administration and ensuring fair financial return to the state from the professional beekeepers who access the public land for their bees. Yet beekeepers and some sites that have been in place for over 50 years are being pushed out without consultation – we have heard that before – justification or consistency. At Wilsons Prom alone, 16 sites are set to be removed, citing vague conservation goals, and in other areas beekeepers have been blamed for the lack of track maintenance, even when they have actually taken the initiative to do the work and keep the tracks open. This treatment is not only unfair, it is dangerous. We have varroa mite – there is a varroa mite incursion in this state. It has come down from New South Wales. There are business failures likely to occur, and the mental health of beekeepers is certainly under serious strain. As I have said, pollination underpins much of our agricultural food supply.
I also raise concern about the disbanding of the Apiculture on Public Lands Engagement Group, aptly named APLEG, which is a communication between government and the bee industry. Bees cannot thrive without access to ongoing floral resources, and often what happens is they can be up on the Murray pollinating the almonds and then, when the summer comes, they are actually taken off and put into – we will say – bee holiday mode, and they go down onto the prom and utilise the floral resources down there. So the action I seek from the minister is to uphold and implement the apiculture on public land policy, reinstate APLEG to restore collaboration and work well with the community of beekeepers and treat beekeepers fairly and consistently across all public land. Indeed the beekeeper industry, food security and the environment depend on our bees.