The Global Credit Crisis has dominated the news for the month, yet there has been virtually nothing written or said by Agriculture Industry leaders on the impacts on, or consequences for our rural industries.
Yesterday Federal Agriculture Minister Tony Burke [pictured] finally took a leadership role by summonsing representatives of Agricultural groups, accountants, the National Rural Advisory Council, ABARE and the big banks to Sydney for a crisis summit.
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“After the meeting, Mr Burke said bank representatives - including those from the big four banks - had given him and farmers assurances the financial meltdown would not swallow up this month’s interest rate cut, or block access to credit.
(I was) able to find out for the farmers … directly from the banks, that in the immediate term they are still open to business, that they are still providing credit to Australia’s farmers,” he said.”
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Farmers now want to know what the outlook is as commodity prices tumble and farm input costs soar. Minister Burke is gloomy in his outlook:
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“We still don’t know what the impact will be on global demand for Australian exports,” he said.
“Certainly it’s true that most farm inputs, such as fertiliser, such as chemical, such as fuel are imported, and so the lower dollar has an impact there.
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On top of these woes Australian farmers are waiting for the minister to spell out to the industry what the financial impacts will be of the proposed emissions trading scheme. Those impacts will be a double whammy as countries like the USA and the EU are expected to increase subsidies to their farmers and impose import tariffs on Australian Ag exports.
The Agmates community looks forward to Minister Burke now providing our Rural industries with strong and decisive leadership as we move forward in these unprecedented times of global economic turmoil.
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Have Your say! Has your bank passed on the interest rate cut yet?