QUEENSLAND farmers have been left severely underwhelmed by the State government’s Regional Plans and the Review of the Strategic Cropping Land (SCL) Framework, which are claimed to protect hundreds of thousands of hectares of the State’s best farming lands.
Farm groups have criticised the plans which cover the Darling Downs and Central Queensland, saying the Newman Government had failed to incorporate key feedback from farmers as to how agriculture and the resources sector should coexist.
Farm groups also remain concerned that still to be finalised coexistence criteria will reflect the expectations of rural industry.
The plans were officially launched by Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney last Thursday.
AgForce president Ian Burnett said the SCL Framework fell well short of what was needed to ensure Queensland’s high quality agricultural land would be protected.
“As AgForce pointed out in our submission to government, the Regional Plan Priority Agricultural Areas cover less than half of the current cropping area within the Darling Downs and only about 40 per cent of those in Central Queensland,” he said.
“Furthermore, the plans’ priority land uses do not include improved grazing areas, such as dryland cropping or the water infrastructure essential to operating irrigated agriculture.
“Despite AgForce raising these concerns with the government on multiple occasions, they were not rectified in the final plans and this is very disappointing.”
Queensland Farmers Federation president Joanne Grainger said while the intent of the new plans was supported, farmers believed that the State Government still had work to do to resolve several uncertainties about how farmland would be protected and how farmers would be given a fair say in how resource activities might occur on their properties.
“We support the policy intent, but require greater detail in order to assess the implications of these changes,” Mrs Grainger said.
“We have been given the positive assurance from the Deputy Premier, but the evidence we have to work with – the regional plans – does not necessarily back it up at this stage. The Regional Plans map out the area of interest, but they do not define how this area will be protected.
“Even then, the area mapped is not consistent with that used across the SCL or Queensland Land Audit methodology.
“So, from a technical perspective, implementation will be complicated.
“It appears that the government’s action is changing this from a soil resource management issue to a planning issue.
“Farmers are not disputing whether or not CSG occurs at all, but they are seeking the right to have a say over how CSG activities would occur on their land.
“The mechanism that gives them this say is still unclear.”
Basin Sustainability Alliance (BSA) chairman David Hamilton said that despite the ongoing consultation process, there had been no change to the end position of the plans.
Mr Hamilton said neither the Regional Plans nor the Review of the Strategic Cropping Land Framework had clarified the issue for farmers, and had not progressed.
“Farmers want to have a fair say on mining projects on their land to ensure that the mining developments and infrastructure do not interfere with their business,” Mr Hamilton said.
“Strategic cropping land should be preserved and looked after, and farm productivity must be maintained.”
Mr Hamilton said mining companies needed to be far more diligent in the restoration of land at the end of a project.
“Mining should not be allowed to occur if strategic cropping land will be degraded forever,” he said.
In its submission to the SCL Act review, AgForce called for an expansion of the agricultural areas covered by the act and an increase in the levels of protection applied to irreplaceable high-quality soil resources.
“Instead, the government has flagged a repeal of the Strategic Cropping Land Act and the downgrading of its provisions into regulations and codes that will sit under a new Regional Planning and Development Act yet to be publicly released,” Mr Burnett said.
“While the government has indicated that there will be a
retention of current levels of protection, any move to regulations means the protections for our state’s irreplaceable soil resources can be altered by the planning minister and potentially without stakeholder consultation, as we have seen recently with changes to the Sustainable Planning Regulations.
“These changes included oil and gas pipelines, and waste and water-treatment facilities as community infrastructure, and excluded them from assessment under the SCL Act.
“Other changes to the SCL Framework include exempting ‘low-impact’ resource activities from SCL assessment, more ministerial discretion in applying the exceptional circumstances exemption for significant resource developments that impact on SCL, a less prescriptive code which sets out how impacts on SCL are managed and restored, and delegating development assessment in relation to SCL to local government.
“While today’s announcement is disappointing, AgForce will seek to continue to work with the government in finalising the coexistence criteria within the regional plans and the structure of the new Regional Planning and Development Act.
“We will also continue to push for a greater say for landholders on what resources activities occur on their properties.”
