Faced with record numbers of international visitors, the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) biosecurity staff have been busy protecting the country's economy and environment.
Among these was the discovery of fruit fly larvae in mangos found at Auckland Airport inside a suitcase from Malaysia jammed full of plant produce and other food.
MPI screened 684,407 air passengers for biosecurity risks last month, an increase of more than 10 per cent (64,121) from January 2016 and intercepted about 12,600 biosecurity risk items last month, including 1829 undeclared items.
"The interceptions show New Zealand's biosecurity system is holding up well in the face of huge numbers of arriving passengers, many of whom have little knowledge of biosecurity," said Craig Hughes, MPI's manager north passenger and mail.
