AGRIBUSINESS

The Hon. C.V. SCHAEFER (15:39): An article on the ABC News today reminded me—and, hopefully, those in this chamber today—of the importance of agriculture not just to South Australia and Australia but to the world in general. In a report from the South Australian Centre for Economic Studies, Associate Professor Owen Covick says that he believes the government's forecast of our return to a bright economy is 'optimistic', and that the Centre for Economic Studies is not as optimistic as the commonwealth Treasury. However, he says, 'Our farming sector will help cushion our overall state economy.'

Similarly, an article in the Stock Journal, referring to the agricultural arm of the Commonwealth Bank, quotes the Commonwealth Bank Agri Indicators Report as saying that the 'agribusiness sector has swung back into positive territory during the past month to deliver gains of 12.8 per cent'. Brendan White, its manager, says:

Of the 15 stocks in the Commonwealth Bank Agribusiness Indicator, 11 returned more than 10 per cent over the past month, with seven stocks experiencing returns greater than 20 per cent, and this shows a 'positive outlook for investors with exposure to stocks within the agribusiness sector.

Against this background, the Managing Director of Woolworths, Michael Luscombe, spoke at the Royal Show in Sydney. It was reported that Mr Luscombe 'added to rising fears that too many Australians are paying lip service to the role of farmers in maintaining the flow of high-quality food in the face of overwhelming adversity including drought and indifferent governments', and, 'That was why he had written to…Mr Rudd late last year, urging him and his government to do everything possible to nurture the farm sector.'

This is against the background of an article in the Scientific American of May this year entitled 'Could food shortages bring down civilisation?' This article raised an enormous number of fears for us all. It states:

Our continuing failure to deal with the environmental declines that are undermining the world food economy—most important, falling water tables, eroding soils and rising temperatures—forces the writer to conclude that a collapse of civilisation as we know it could occur due to food shortages.

The article continues:

In six of the past nine years world grain production has fallen short of consumption, forcing a steady drawdown in stocks. When the 2008 harvest began, world carry-over stocks of grain (the amount in the bin when the new harvest begins) were at 62 days of consumption; a near record low. In response, world grain prices in the spring and summer of last year climbed to the highest level ever. As demand for food rises faster than supplies are growing, the resulting food-price inflation puts severe stress on the governments of countries already teetering on the edge of chaos.

It continues:

States fail when national governments can no longer provide personal security, food security and basic social services…After a point, countries can become so dangerous that food relief workers are no longer safe and their programs are halted; in Somalia and Afghanistan deteriorating conditions have already put such programs in jeopardy.

I raise these issues at a time when I have just been told that, yet again, a number of agricultural offices will be closed, and the SARDI and agricultural budgets slashed tomorrow. I understand that the offices in Jamestown, Loxton, Kadina, Streaky Bay and Keith will be announced as closing in tomorrow's budget. My question to this chamber, to South Australia and to Australians, is: when are we going to wake up as to what is important in this state?