Over the past week, more than a century of flood records were broken in rivers in the Cairns and Daintree region, as the relatively low-level category ex-Tropical Cyclone Jasper caused heavy rain and flooding across North Queensland.
Significant damage to communities and industry within the impact zone has ensued, with power and telecommunication outages, road closures and many people displaced seeking emergency accommodation.
While the impact on farmers and agriculture is still being assessed, extensive farm erosion, crop and infrastructure damage, loss of machinery and stock is evident across the region. Significant disruptions to supply chains are already playing out with damage being reported to chicken processing plants, sugar milling and cane rail infrastructure. In and out access between farms and all aspects of the supply chain have been impacted.
Damage to nursery stock, mango and banana production will hit the horticulture sector hard while reports of close to 100 per cent damage to rotational crops are still being confirmed. Major crop loss estimates for the cane industry are coming through and are expected to be in excess of 1 million tonnes of cane. For canegrowers, the loss of young plant cane will mean crop and income impacts for at least the next 18 months.
With many farmers completely cut off by floodwater or their workforces impacted personally with homes inundated or damaged, production in most farms has come to a standstill as clean-up and immediate personal safety takes priority.
Category B activation has taken place for the Cairns, Cassowary, Cook, Hinchinbrook, Douglas, Mareeba and Tablelands local government areas with Category C and Category D applications also under way. People affected by the floods will be eligible for payments to help their recovery under two different schemes.
A one-off payment for people who have suffered a significant loss as a result of the floods will be accessible through the Australian Government Disaster Recovery Payment and longer-term support through the Disaster Recovery Allowance is available for eligible employees or sole traders who experience a loss of income as a direct result of this natural disaster.
Primary producers who have sustained any damage to property or crops are encouraged to complete the Queensland Agriculture Disaster Impact Survey.
As the extent of damage continues to become clearer and the clean-up gets under way, our thoughts go out to those in the affected areas. This will be a challenging time for farmers and the communities in which they live and I encourage you all to get behind North Queensland in whatever way you can.
