On Tuesday 20 May 2025, the Plant Health Australia (PHA) Board of Directors convened in Adelaide, South Australia for Board Meeting 119 (BM119). 

The Board noted the 25th anniversary of the establishment of PHA as the national coordinator of Australia’s plant biosecurity. They received a number of updates and progress reports around strategy, compliance and financials, thanking the PHA team for their work in implementing the company’s Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system that recently went live. They also supported the opportunity for a small contingent of the PHA team to travel to New Zealand (NZ) in August 2025, to attend a simulation exercise on Brown marmorated stink bug with Government Industry Agreement (GIA), Ministry for Primary Industries and industry colleagues. The team will also attend other biosecurity readiness and response activities currently underway in NZ to share knowledge and learnings and continue to strengthen biosecurity collaboration between our nations. 

During BM119, the Board also discussed several key strategic, financial, operational and people matters, including: 

• PHA’s compliance with obligations under the Emergency Plant Pest Response Deed (ERPPD) management and key EPPRD activities and outcomes 

• the planned external audit and annual report production timelines 

• the cyber threat environment and PHA’s cybersecurity strategies 

• the annual Board performance evaluation 

• results of the Employee engagement survey 

The next meeting of the Board will be a strategy workshop on 23-24 July 2025 in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory.