THE Onions Australia annual conference scheduled for October, has been cancelled.
A message from Onions Australia chief executive, Lechelle Earl, confirmed the cancellation this week, citing border restrictions as one of the main reasons for not going ahead.
The conference was to be held at Tailem Bend, South Australia.
"However, we intend to hold our AGM via Zoom in mid October, and also run a levy payer update via the same platform to ensure growers are kept up to date with what's happening in the industry," Ms Earl said.
"We were hanging on to hope that we could proceed, but were left with little choice but to cancel."
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Earlier in the year, Onions Australia was forced to cancel its levy payers' meeting that was set for June.
"At this stage, our next face to face meeting will be in Brisbane, June 6, 2021 in the lead up to Hort Connections," Ms Earl said.
"We have also rescheduled our Tailem Bend event to October 14-15, 2021 - so keep practicing those go kart manoeuvres."
Nominations for the OA executive committee close on August 21 with six positions available.
For more information, or to download the nomination form here, visit: onionsaustralia.org.au/news/notice-of-nomination-2020/
Despite the disruption to the industry's yearly meetings, Ms Earl was upbeat about the prospects for onions in general in a year that "just keeps throwing up the challenges".
"We are seeing panic buying kick up again, with limits put in place in some states regarding onion purchases, among other items," she said.
"Rest assured we won't run out of onions - there are still onions in storage in the southern states and already increased demand for supply has been experienced."
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