THE state’s peak agriculture body, NSW Farmers’ Association, has welcomed a new government initiative to address acute shortages of vets across rural New South Wales.
Under the NSW Government’s Welcome Experience program, vets, vet nurses, vet technicians and their families are now eligible to receive assistance with sourcing housing, childcare and other services when moving to rural New South Wales.
Dr Robyn Alders said news of the initiative had been warmly welcomed by farming communities across the state, as they continued to grapple with critical workforce shortages.
“Farmers know that healthy animals are productive animals and it’s in their best interests to care for their livestock – but the reality is they need to have access to vets if they are to successfully protect animal health on-farm,” Dr Alders said.
“Effective surveillance, detection and response to animal disease is also reliant on a strong veterinary sector, and this has been proven time and time again during recent outbreaks of exotic animal disease in southern Australia, and detections of notifiable animal disease in NSW.
“We need our vets, and it’s great to see our government recognise this.”
However, Dr Alders warned further solutions to address the shortage of veterinary workers were still necessary, with mentoring, training and incentive programs just some of the solutions proposed by NSW Farmers in a recent inquiry into vet shortages last year.
“If we want to build a sustainable veterinary workforce here in rural NSW, then we need a range of solutions that address the complex challenges that have caused this shortage in the first place,” Dr Alders said.
“Incentives such as waiving student debt for graduate vets who take up work in rural NSW would make a real difference in attracting vets to rural communities, as would more partnerships between the public and private vet sectors in support of rapid exotic animal disease detection and control in NSW.
“Around the world governments are supporting a range of initiatives to ensure the availability of appropriate, affordable veterinary services to livestock producers, and it’s critical our government does the same.”
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