The Queensland agricultural show circuit is currently plagued by COVID related issues, forcing many show societies to postpone their events until later this year.
In recent weeks there has been a stream of show committees having to either change, postpone, or in the case of Allora, cancel their upcoming shows.
On Thursday, President of the Pittsworth Show Society Lindsey Lack shared a message to Facebook advising that the show will go ahead on the first weekend of March, but with a modified program consisting of only the livestock sections.
Pittsworth Show Society member Delcie McCoy said they were committed to keeping the community safe and that meant heavily reducing the show program.
"We've had to take out our entire pavilion, yard dogs, the rodeo, the bar, there's no sideshow alley, there's none of that. There's no trade sites or food sites," she said.
"Everything has been removed that you would normally have at a show. It is very disappointing."
Oakey, Milemerran and Stanthorpe have also chosen to postpone their shows until later dates, which are yet to be decided.
General manager of the Queensland Chamber of Agricultural Societies Inc. (QCAS), Trevor Beckingham, said of the eighteen shows planned before Easter, only six were guaranteed to go ahead at this stage.
"I've got two that are running modified events, but there are a heap that are being postponed because they're hoping for better days ahead," Mr Beckingham said.
"I actually have a rotary resolution out to my board at the present time to approve some new show dates for some of these postponed shows.
"The biggest challenge we've got is that because we have 130 shows and a 40 week show season, we're going to double up even more so if we've got some coming out of where they should be.
"It's a juggling act to say the least but we try to do the best that we can and trying to be as supportive as we can."
Mr Beckingham said the vaccine mandate, fear factor and unprecedented costs were all COVID related issues facing the show societies.
"In every case they are putting their community first, but the biggest problem is that everyone is afraid of attending a super spreader event, and I think the government has been very effective in getting that fear campaign out and unfortunately we're suffering as a result," he said.
"We ran 116 of our 129 shows last year and not one single case of COVID could be attributed to one of our shows."
Many committees were hesitant to go ahead considering the added security needed to enforce the vaccine mandate, as well the division that this would cause within communities.
"That's just not a tenable situation," Mr Beckingham said.
"I know for a fact that Stanthorpe had a quote for $30,000 to provide security and they just said we cannot afford to do that, it would bankrupt the show."
QCAS staff and board members are hoping that an updated government directive will declare either the easing or lifting of restrictions to avoid more postponements or cancellations.
"I'm effectively looking down the barrel or losing all of my shows, as in postponing or changing one way or another, before Easter," Mr Beckingham said.
"But we've still got some like Toowoomba, Warwick, and some of the smaller ones that are going ahead and that's great to see.
"In some places there are really strong communities and they're banding together saying we're not going to let this beat us or get us down and we will put on our show.
"That's the attitude at Proston, that someone would have to call on the national guard to shut them down. Come hell or high water it's going to go ahead."
Proston show will host the state final of the young judges and paraders competition after the Stanthorpe show was postponed earlier this month.
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