The intensive search for the invasive crop weed velvetleaf in Southland earlier this year cost at least $697,000, but the final tally will probably never be known, Environment Southland (ES) biosecurity manager Richard Bowman says.
Velvetleaf affects crops by competing for nutrients, space and water.
An unwanted organism under New Zealand biosecurity regulations, it is believed to have entered New Zealand in contaminated fodder-beet seed from Italy.
In March and April, at the request of the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI), ES led a "search and destroy'' operation in Southland, discovering plants on 55 properties over 59 days. Nationwide, plants were recovered from 251 properties, including 45 in Otago.
Responding to an Official Information Act request, Mr Bowman said as at June 1, ES' costs were $697,697.86, although some smaller bills might yet be received.
ES had invoiced MPI and its contractor AsureQuality $471,324.26, most of which had already been paid, he said.
The total covered staff time, the cost of renting minivans to transport search teams and consumables such as fuel, lunches and bottled water.
"We had people looking for plants for us, and we had to ensure they were cared for.''
On April 13, ES was asked by MPI to review its contribution to the response, Mr Bowman said.
Between that date and April 29 up to 30 ES staff remained involved in the response, in field, logistics and operational roles.
The cost over that period was $226,373. ES had agreed not to ask MPI to reimburse that money, Mr Bowman said.
"Most of it was for salaries, and those people would have had to be paid anyway.''
As well as ES' costs, MPI and AsureQuality would have also incurred costs in Southland, he said.
He did not know how much their costs were, he said.
"MPI may release it at some stage, but it is possible we will never know.''
Earlier this month, MPI national incident controller David Yard said search costs nationally totalled more than $1million, although regional breakdowns were not yet available.
