Shadow Minister for Agriculture, John Cobb [pictured] writes:
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Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Tony Burke has announced the Rudd Government will introduce a new tax on agricultural exports by moving to 100 percent full cost recovery for AQIS export inspection services.
Not only would the Rudd Government be introducing a new full cost recovery tax, it is increasing AQIS fees by up to 1352 percent.
The Coalition today branded a proposed tax hike of 1352 percent on agriculture exporters as ‘crazy stuff’, especially in light of the fact that the only sector to record any growth last quarter was agriculture.
The Prime Minister was creating his own ‘perfect economic storm’ by massively increasing taxes on our agricultural exporters, which will lead to jobs losses and business closures in regional Australia.
Our exporters are struggling, the credit crunch has hit them hard and their margins are being slashed, to increase taxes and fees is the equivalent of committing economic suicide.
It’s almost as if Minister Burke is deliberately trying to increase the economic pressure on our exporters, when they can least afford it.
The Rudd Government is spending $6 billion to bailout the car industry which employs 50,000 workers, the same amount of people as the meat industry, yet is slugging the meat industry with a tax and extra charges.
Industry is ropable with One Australian agriculture exporting company wrote to me stating;
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“The proposed increase on 1 July 2009 in AQIS certification charges relating to Health certificates and the issuing of other export documents of between 767% and 1352% threatens the viability of our business. Should these proposed charges be implemented the cost to our business for these same services would increase by some AUD 618,000 to AUD 684,000 – in excess of a 10 fold increase.
Such a cost increase is simply abhorrent, uneconomic and has the potential to derail export business that this company has spent years developing.”
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In dollar terms the largest impost would be the meat industry, with the new tax adding up to $5 per head for cattle and up to $0.50 per head on sheep to process them, the bulk of this will be past back to primary producers.
Other industries such as the seafood industry will also be hard hit with the abalone, tuna and rock lobster industries already experiencing extremely tight margins and will struggle to absorb the new tax.
The Horticulture industry has already expressed concern that they are operating on extremely low margins, and both cherry exports and $30 million worth of citrus exports to Japan are being placed in jeopardy.
Our dairy exporters have recently been hit with a 50 percent price cut and a massive increase in European subsidies and can not afford a new tax on exports.
It is extraordinary that at the same time as our major competitors are increasing subsidies and protectionism the Rudd Government is hitting ours with a new tax.
This announcement will cost jobs in regional Australia.
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