Farmers ventilate 2017 policy demands

Responding to a social media call-out, grain farmer Brendan Taylor from Warra in Queensland’s Darling Downs region said he wanted the government to advance building the inland rail from Brisbane to Melbourne, to help cut the hefty, profit-eating costs of transporting grain from farm to port.

Mr Taylor said rail infrastructure was a “must” policy priority for farmers in 2017 with freight costs being a “killer” for farm-profits.

He said it was more expensive to move grains like wheat and chick peas about 260kms from his farm in Warra to the Brisbane port than the cost of transporting it from there, in bulk or containers, about 9000kms away to India.

“The sooner we can get the inland rail built the better,” he said.

Mr Taylor said it cost him about $40 per tonne to transport grain to port but if the inland rail was completed and operational he could save $5 to $10 per tonne - adding $20,000 to $30,000 per year to his farm-gate profits.

The $10 billion inland rail project is a priority for Transport and Infrastructure Minister and senior Victorian Nationals MP Darren Chester, requiring decisions on where and when to build about 600kms of new rail tracks and locate strategic inter-modal hubs.

Victorian dairy farmer and industry leader Lisa Dwyer said she wasn’t convinced that the big issues for farmers were a lot different from those of business generally.

She said Australian agriculture needed strong government, supported by the Senate and, where it was in the nation's best interests, by the Opposition.

“We need leadership that focuses on core issues, rather than fashionable causes and real progress made in tax reform - including reduced company tax - industrial relations reform that actually drives increased employment growth rather than stymies it, a commitment to digital connectivity in the regions and continued investment in agricultural R&D,” she said.

On Twitter, National Farmers’ President and NSW Liverpool Plains farmer Fiona Simson said her farm policy priorities for 2017 were trade and markets for Australian produce along with digital and “other” infrastructure.

CASE IH machinery dealership manager Sam Collier from Wee Waa in NSW also highlighted digital connectivity as a policy priority for federal parliament this year, in the areas of mobile, phone and internet.

Nuffield Scholar Jonathan Dyer from Victoria’s Wimmera region reminded Canberra’s political elite that Australian farmers needed global trade “in an era of populist protectionism”.

Digital connectivity has been a policy priority for NSW Nationals Senator and Regional Development and Regional Communications Minister Fiona Nash, while market access impacts the portfolios of Agriculture and Water Resources Minister Barnaby Joyce and Trade Minister Steven Ciobo.

Farmer, social media enthusiast and Nick Xenophon Team candidate for the South Australian rural seat of Barker at last year’s federal election James Stacey said, energy pricing for electricity was, “impacting both production agriculture and food processing”.

Lock the Gate national coordinator and land manager Phil Laird highlighted his policy priorities as being; land use conflict, corruption, climate change, digital drought and mental health.

Leading young farm advocate and mixed producer from Caragabal in central-western NSW Daniel Cooper pointed to power prices, supply chain costs, red tape, industrial relations and “all the stuff that's been promised to fix and we've seen (nothing)”.

He said the government’s policy priorities for this year should be, “the things that make farmers uncompetitive globally”.

On Twitter, Peter Holding, a mixed crop and sheep farmer from Harden in NSW called for a political focus on effective energy and climate change policy and “grains industry future”.

Rural photographer and writer Fiona Lake from Townsville in Queensland said the Zone Tax Offset that she’s long-championed should be brought into the twenty-first century.

Sydney based Alexandra Hall said beef producers would like a focus on political inquiry into processors because, “there's absolutely the perception that they put downward pressure on prices”.

Josh Frydenberg has been the Minister for the Environment and Energy since last year’s election but has said little, if anything, in regards to any impacts of his portfolio on farm viability, as has Treasurer Scott Morrison.

But Mr Frydenberg’s Department will conduct a broad-ranging review of climate policies this year including looking at the opportunities and challenges of reducing emissions on a sector-by-sector basis.

That policy examination is sure to spark a farm sector response due to concerns about potential impacts and cost hikes for farmers, through any new Emissions Trading Scheme.

Beef producer and outback photographer from Queensland Ann Britton cited cost of production, infrastructure, equipment and freight on her list of core policy demands.

She also warned government against imposing regulations “made with no regard to common sense” that impact farm viability.

Mr Taylor said his farm region and others in central Queensland were facing extremely dry conditions which had thwarted summer planting plans.

He said Queensland normally had two or three cyclones per year during summer which provided subsequent rain events for farmers to aid moisture levels for their cropping programs - this season there was likely to be none.

Mr Taylor said there had been sporadic storm rain events in summer but nothing significant since September last year.

“We were sweating on planting mung beans over the Christmas and New Years’ period but we never got any planting rains so the seed is still sitting in the shed,” he said.

“There’ll be a significant shortfall in the mung bean trade this year due to the big shortage in plantings.”