Harmonisation of disease management practices across global space and the devolution of responsibility to a broader range of actors are two increasingly important approaches for ordering biosecurity governance. While these forms of ordering have been examined individually, the social science biosecurity literature provides limited insights into how they interact and interfere with one another, and the consequences for biosecurity implementation. This paper draws upon an institutional logics approach to examine the different and competing logics through which government agencies, industry bodies and farming enterprises engage in biosecurity. It focuses specifically on the ways in which these logics pose challenges for harmonisation of biosecurity as well as create alternative spaces of negotiation for making life safe. Through the analysis of policy documents and semi-structured interviews with government and industry stakeholders, as well as with beef producers, we identify three institutional logics being the neoliberal, productivist and agrarian logics. We argue that the existence of multiple logics poses significant challenges for efforts to achieve improved harmonisation of biosecurity in an environment of devolved responsibility to industry, farming bodies and producers. In this context, greater emphasis by stakeholders on the productivist logic holds the most potential for improving biosecurity implementation in that it works with existing agricultural circulations and flows, and with producers' herd health practices.

International efforts to prevent the spread of biological threats to agro-food production are increasingly being devolved from national governments to farming industries and farmers. Previous research has highlighted the farm-level and institutional challenges in engaging farmers in biosecurity. However, little is known sociologically about what farmers already know and do to manage disease risk, and specifically how they practice biosecurity. This article addresses this issue through the application of theoretical work on the choreography of care. Drawing from a qualitative study of biosecurity in the Australian beef industry, we argue that farmers' localised practices of caring for their herd health and farm are crucial in making biosecurity workable. These practices take two key forms: skilled craftwork, through which farmers construct and hold together different objects and elements of care; and fluid engineering, which involves efforts to construct barriers for separating on-farm practices of care from perceived off-farm disease risks. In engaging in these care practices, farmers make an important contribution to national livestock biosecurity principles and practices. We argue that greater recognition of localised practices of biosecure care may provide the basis for engaging farmers more effectively in a devolved form of biosecurity governance.

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Farmers of this specific sample presented a unique work-home interface. Limitations include the small sample size, recruitment methods, and culturally irrelevant measures as well as only assessing work-related stresses. Future research should aim to develop measures appropriate for farmers of Australia.