00:05For well over 100 years, the Clarence River in northern New South Wales has been a source
00:11of food and work. Recently, that's changed. Trawling for prawns runs deep into the make-up
00:20of this community and it's in trouble.
00:24It's been a long track for the last three years, not being able to work on the small
00:28prawn industry type of prawn. It's to the stage now where we've virtually given up hope.
00:37The issue? White Spot is back in the waterway.
00:41Glenn Dawson is the Clarence River Prawn Committee Chair. He says the people of the region are
00:47struggling and doing their best to survive. Living on our savings, most of us. There's
00:53a few of us are lucky enough to be able to go and catch mullet and catch other fish.
00:58There's quite a few that, you know, they're doing nothing. Trying to get them onto Centrelink,
01:04which we've tried to help them all out in, are bloody near impossible.
01:08So what is White Spot? White Spot is a highly contagious disease of crustaceans that can kill
01:14farm prawns and other farm crustaceans quickly. While crustaceans can carry White Spot and be
01:20affected, but population impacts like those seen in farm crustaceans are not known to occur. White Spot
01:26does not affect people and New South Wales prawns and seafood remain safe to eat.
01:33In 2022, White Spot was first detected in an enclosed hatchery facility on the Clarence River.
01:40And then later in 2023, it was detected in local prawn farms.
01:45The New South Wales DPI are being cautious. The fishers themselves say there are flaws in the testing.
01:53No White Spot in the river never, ever has been. It's only in the ocean. And we believe the last
01:58test in the ocean was caused by the cyclone we had there 12 months ago. That current from Queensland,
02:05where the White Spot is predominant up there, that current run at over five knots down the east
02:10coast. And we believe those prawns come from up there. Melissa Walker is the manager for aquatic
02:16biosecurity programs at New South Wales Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development.
02:22She says it's reasonable to ask why the river is being treated as a hot zone,
02:26a place where biosecurity restrictions apply. Being a wild school prawn population that it was
02:32detected in later in 2024 and then in 2025 outside of Evans and Richmond and the Clarence Rivers in 2025,
02:41we were unable to separate those areas between the river and that near offshore area in the oceanic populations.
02:51There are no vaccines for White Spot, so treating them en masse isn't an option. And the only way of
02:58killing the disease is by cooking the prawns. Currently under the NSW Biosecurity White Spot Control
03:05order, the requirements are that prawns must be cooked before they move outside of the zone.
03:11All right.
Comments