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Victorians urged not to panic buy as supermarkets get extra time to meet Covid staffing levels

<span>Photograph: Darrian Traynor/Getty Images</span>
Photograph: Darrian Traynor/Getty Images

Supermarkets and medical suppliers in Victoria have been given another three days to meet new coronavirus-related restrictions on staffing levels as the premier pleaded with consumers: “Don’t buy enormous quantities of food.”

Amid concerns about possible food shortages as a result of the state’s drastic response to the Covid-19 crisis, Daniel Andrews said on Thursday that providers of essential products would be given more time to recalibrate their operations to comply with a one-third reduction in staffing.

Andrews said that driving down the number of people going to work was a key objective of his plan to tackle the crisis, which has claimed the lives of 170 Victorians.

Businesses had expected to have to reduce staffing at warehouses by one-third by midnight on Friday night, raising concerns that supermarket and pharmacy shelves could be stripped bare as happened at the beginning of the first outbreak in March.

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But they will now have until midnight on Sunday to obtain what Andrews called the right balance between reducing movement across the state and keeping shelves stocked.

He asked consumers to resist the temptation to “stockpile months and months of food”.

“You may not necessarily be able to get exactly the cut of meat that you want but you will get what you need and you will get all the products that are, basically, fundamentally important to you. They will be there,” he said at his daily briefing in Melbourne.

“It’ll only make things harder if people who have the means to do it, go and buy enormous quantities of food.”

Paul Guerra, the chief executive of the Victorian chamber of commerce, said on Thursday that businesses needed more details, exposing a lack of planning that one business expert said was a failing across the whole country.

Flavio Romero Macau, a senior lecturer in business at Edith Cowan University in Perth and an expert in supply chains, said the virus had shown that more coordination was needed.

“The supply chain has had to coordinate a response by itself and that means we get a suboptimal solution,” he said. “If we want to be more ready for this in the future we should have a dialogue allowing all stakeholders to have a coordinated plan.

“Everyone will then know what to do: the government, the businesses, the community all know what to do and then it will be better.”

However, Macau said that despite concerns, any shortages in supermarkets would be temporary, even when they have to limit staffing to two-thirds by Sunday night.

“The big players such as supermarkets will redirect excess capacity from other states in Victoria, so we shouldn’t see shortages,” he said, noting that the supermarkets had invested heavily in technology at their distribution centres – the all-important hubs of the food system – and relied much less on “people in forklifts or people carrying boxes”.

“They are ahead of the curve. They might be reduced by a third, but as long as their maintenance is good on their systems they should be able to run at more than 67% capacity – maybe 85 to 90%.”

A spokesperson for Coles said: “We will continue to monitor our stock position and make further adjustments as required to ensure as many customers as possible can buy the food and groceries they need.”

The trucking industry played down concerns that drivers would get held up at the New South Wales-Victoria border if more supplies had to be delivered interstate.

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Simon O’Hara, the chief executive of Road Freight NSW, said it was important to keep freight moving and to keep food on supermarket shelves. There was currently no problem getting over the border as long as drivers had a Covidsafe plan and a worker permit for Victoria, he said.

However, the situation was changing every day and he warned that, with constant updates, it was important not to interfere too much with supply chains.

“Generally, supply chains have a lot of threads to them and if you tinker with it, you’ve got to be really, really careful.”

Despite concerns about meat shortages as a result of processing factories being subject to staffing reductions, the industry welcomed clarification of the regulations on Thursday, which meant that poultry producers could operate at 80% of capacity to avoid any loss of supply.

It had been feared that because of the different life cycle of poultry, a two-thirds reduction in capacity could cut off too much supply.

It was also revealed on Thursday that sites with less than 25 workers would be exempt, easing pressure on the industry.

“Regarding supply and prices of meat, it is still challenging to forecast,” said Patrick Hutchinson, the chief executive of the Australian Meat Industry Council.

“What is positive for the community is that the over 800 independent retail butchers across Victoria remain open and any change to that would severely impact the ability of the community to access product.”