Northern Australia Quarantine Strategy plant health surveys: over thirty years of a globally unique on- and off-shore solution to island nation biosecurity challenges

Abstract

As the Northern Australia Quarantine Strategy (NAQS) approaches its thirty-fifth year of operations, we outline the Australian Government’s approach to address extraordinary natural and human mediated biosecurity challenges across our sparsely populated northern shores. NAQS is a concept that is unique worldwide but could be equally well applied in many other island nations dealing with similar circumstances. Key to the success of the NAQS has been long collaborations with biosecurity scientists in the neighbouring nations to the north. Some examples of how these relationships have borne fruit as we tackle regionally important plant diseases are illustrated. We also focus on how the plant pathology component of the program developed and evolved from the early 1990s to 2023.