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November quarter farm institute insights
PDF copy of farm institute insights available here
Feature Article
Food security, food reality and Australian agricultural opportunity
Mick Keogh: Australian Farm Institute
As recently as five years ago, food security was a term used when discussing the food supply situation in drought stricken and impoverished developing nations. More recently, however, food security has emerged as a major policy issue in developed nations such as Australia. Unfortunately, much of the policy discussion is misinformed, and some of the proposed solutions are likely to make global food insecurity worse, rather than better. While the issue represents a significant opportunity for Australian agriculture, policy-makers are currently infected with ‘mining myopia’ and have failed to grasp that the agriculture sector can make a major contribution to global food security and deliver sustained wealth for Australia.
Australia is one of the most food secure nations on earth, and is in absolutely no danger of having insufficient food for its population. In fact, Australia ranks fourth in the world behind only Brazil, Argentina and the Netherlands as a net exporter of agricultural products. Depending on the year, Australia exports between 60 and 70% of its total agricultural output, meaning the nation’s farm businesses provide for the food needs of Australia’s 22 million people, plus at least another 50–60 million overseas.
No doubt some will claim that Australia’s current agricultural systems are unsustainable, but the facts confound this argument. For a wide range of agriculture sector indicators including water, fertiliser and energy use efficiency, and rates of adoption of technologies such as conservation tillage and precision agricultural systems, Australian agriculture either leads the world, or is included amongst the top one or two nations.Australian farmers achieve this, despite farming in some of the world’s most variable climates, and in the almost complete absence of government subsidies or payments for environmental services. Reinforcing this, the most recently published OECD review of world agricultural policies (OECD 2011) identified that Australia expends the lowest amount of public funding on agriculture as a percentage of GDP (0.12%) of any nation globally.
In the pipeline
The economic impact of the suspension of live cattle exports.
Discoveries
Will woolgrowers get a boost from carbon farming?
Read more here
In my view
Tony Windsor MP, Independent Federal Member for New England, and Senator Barnaby Joyce, Shadow Minister for Regional Development, Infrastructure and Water; Leader of the Nationals in the Senate; and LNP Senator for Queensland, provide their views on the role of the Australian Government in decision-making about the future use of prime agricultural land. Readers are invited to continue the discussion on the Institute’s blog.
Crossing the divide
Why red meat production is the ‘mouse’ in the room in discussions about global warming.
Read more here
Farm policy news
EU CAP proposal released; dairy deregulation also removed data dairy industry data; has the ACCC priced the full shopping basket?; and a the future of US agricultural policy
Institute activities
A review of Australian Farm Institute activities including media interviews and presentations.