Federal Shadow Minister for Agriculture, John Cobb writes:
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The Rudd Government is compromising our farmers’ ability to feed and clothe the nation after admitting it would be slashing research jobs and funding in next weeks budget.
I hope the Governments decision to cut the Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation (RIRDC) by 25% was not linked to a recent report by RIRDC which highlighted the heavy burden the Rudd Government emissions trading scheme would have on the profitability and productivity of Australia’s agricultural industries.
If the Prime Minister can lose the plot and reduce a RAAF VIP jet hostess to tears because he didn’t get a hot meal, I shudder to think what he would do to an taxpayer funded organisation which broke his governments tightly scripted spin and highlighted the extremely negative consequences of his ETS on agriculture.
Farmers are already being forced to produce more with less, in particular less water and less arable land, and without increasing public expenditure to dramatically increase productivity there was the very real possibility of Australia becoming a net importer of food at a time the worlds population is set to double within the next thirty years.
Without real increases in funding for agriculture research and development the cheap, high quality, clean and green food we take for granted in Australia will be relegated to the history books.
Similarly the only way we are going to tackle the worst affects of climate change is to produce new plant varieties that can cope with droughts, new disease and fungus strains (such as Rust in wheat) and increase yields.
The Prime Minister has already made cuts to vital agriculture R & D when he slashed $63 million from the CSIRO’s budget with the majority of those cuts coming out of the agriculture research leading to the decision to close the Merbein Laboratory in North West Victoria and the JM Rendel Laboratory at Rockhampton in Queensland.
This has been compounded by State Labor Government’s in NSW and Victoria also slashing their agriculture R & D budgets and closing down research institutes.
It is the height of hypocrisy for the Minister for Agriculture, Tony Burke to be swanning around Europe as an observer to the G8 Agriculture Minister’s meeting two weeks ago where he claimed in a media release;
“Australia has a major role to play in meeting the global food shortage and boosting global food security … We believe investment in agricultural research will be essential.”
I can only hope the Minister for Agriculture hasn’t ratted out his constituents completely and we still have a functioning Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry after Tuesday night’s budget .
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