Anyone who’s watched Border Force knows that our customs officers see some absolutely wild shit, and it’s not always because someone’s trying to smuggle a ton of coke into the country.
A whopping 340,000 items were confiscated at the border last year according to data from the Department of Agriculture and Water Resources, with nearly a third of them seized at Sydney‘s Kingsford Smith Airport.
The items included 20,000 kilograms of meat, around 7,000kg of seafood, 3,000kg of seeds, and – wait for it – 2,000kg of bananas. You can get those here, man. We have a monument built just for it. You don’t have to be hiding them in your bags and shit.
In terms of specifics, some of the items were, uh… Well they’re pretty fucked. There was a barbecued rat, lizard’s feet, duck tongues, goat foetuses, and fucking skinned frogs. Obviously, all of this bizarre shit poses a pretty serious threat to our biosecurity.
“Any one of the items could cause devastation to the agriculture industry, the environment or humans, through disease,” said Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources, David Littleproud.
“Agriculture, fisheries and forestry employ more than 300,000 Australians, put $63 billion into the economy and supply 93 per cent of domestic food, according to the National Farmers’ Federation.”
Other items people attempted to smuggle into the country include an enormous African snail and a handful of snakes. I must admit, that snail looks majestic as hell. I’d ride it into battle if I could. A proud mollusc.
If you’re reading this outside of Australia and reckon you’ll bring a few goat foetuses with you on your next holiday down under – probs don’t, hey.
