AHBIC Levy Reform | Seeking Feedback from Victorian Beekeepers

The Australian Honey Bee Industry Council (AHBIC) is reviewing the honey levy, and the VAA Board wants to hear your views before the industry takes this further. The main proposal is to broaden the levy beyond honey to include pollination services and queen bees, and to change it from a fixed rate per kilogram to a percentage of sales. These are proposals only, not a final decision.

We have created a six-question anonymous survey to gather feedback on the proposed reforms. You can link to the survey here. 

The survey questions are: 

1. Do you support expanding the levy arrangements to include commercial pollination services?
2. Do you consider the proposed levy structure fair and equitable across honey producers, commercial pollinators and other beekeeping businesses?
3. What impact could the proposed changes have on your business, including operating costs, cash flow, competitiveness and the ability to provide pollination services. 
4. Are there alternative approaches to calculating or collecting the levy that should be considered?
5. Are there particular exemptions, thresholds or safeguards that should be included?
6. What changes or additional information would you like AHBIC to consider before finalising its recommendations?

To help you respond to these questions, you can find more information at our Levy Reform Resources webpage. There you will find the following: 

• Two-page VAA summary of the existing levy structure and proposed reforms. 
• Link to DAFF webpage on Honey Levy.
• Link to AHBIC webpage on Industry Levies
• AHBIC Levy Reform Business Case
• Link to VAA Six-Question Survey

vaa Education and Communications Grant | Year 2 Approved

In September 2025, the VAA was awarded two grants under the DEECA Livestock Biosecurity Grant Program. One of those grants was for a three-year program to support VAA's efforts to make investments in its biosecurity education and communications capabilities. These investments are intended to help the VAA continue the important biosecurity work that was started with the National Transition to Management (T2M) program. This program is known as the VAA EdComm Project. The EdComm subcommittee has been meeting bi-weekly since September 2025 and has delivered a range of events and communications during the first 12 months. We submitted our final project report to DEECA in September 2026. We received news this week that Year 2 of the grant has been approved so the EdComm subcommittee will begin work on our 2026-2027 projects. 

We will update everyone on this year's projects in upcoming bulletins! 

Congratulations to the EdComm project team: Mark Bichan, Lindsay Callaway, Andrew Wootton, Vicki Elliot, Stafford Kelly, Tony Wilsmore and Paul McCrory. The EdComm project teams collaborates closely with the VAA's Editorial Team which includes Lindsay Callaway, Andrew Wootton, Olivia Ducommun-Dit-Verron, Kris Fricke, Stafford Kelly, Tony Wilsmore and Tino Corsetti. 

Ag Chemicals Skill Set for Beekeeper | New November Course Dates

Beekeeping teacher position | Melbourne Polytechnic | Apply now!

Melbourne Polytechnic is recruiting for a teaching position in their beekeeping program. You can download a position description here. 

You can apply for the position here.