INGHAMS ENTERPRISES

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE (15:05): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries a question with regard to Inghams Chickens.

Leave granted.

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: The Ingham family business, known as Inghams Enterprises, is presently for sale. It is a company that, amongst other things, is best known for its chicken meat processing. Inghams Enterprises employs more than 8,000 people in over 100 locations in Australia and New Zealand, it controls about 35 per cent of its market and has 49 landholdings, last estimated by ANZ to be worth $358 million. The business is said to be worth about $2 billion and potential buyers include Thai conglomerate CP Group, Brazilian beef giant JBS and Chinese state-owned enterprise COFCO.

Approximately 1,500 Inghams employees are employed in South Australia at chicken processing plants at Bolivar and Edinburgh Parks and a turkey processing plant at Foggos Road, McLaren Flat. South Australia and Queensland are said to be the main producing states for the company, with each producing one million birds a week. It was reported today that the 2011 South Australian Food Scorecard showed that chicken meat production has nearly doubled in the state, rising from $232 million to $436 million in the past five years. That reportedly includes the shifting of chicken processing facilities into South Australia from the Eastern States.

I note that in the past there has been promised, and perhaps delivered, a $42 million loan (in 2006) to Inghams to set up Edinburgh Parks, if not more in grants in 2005. At the time, I believe the Hon. Rob Lucas described that as one of the biggest assistance packages given to business, alongside Mitsubishi. Minister Conlon, at that time, said the Edinburgh Parks project was the:

...culmination of a great deal of work with industry and Local Government and various State Government agencies, including the Land Management Corporation and Primary Industries and Resources SA.

Therefore, my questions to the minister are:

1. Has the minister, in her capacity as Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries, had a briefing on the possible jobs implications for South Australia from this sale?

2. Does this sale threaten the government's target as per its 9 February 2006 press release for interstate exports of chicken to reach $500 million by 2015?

3. Is the minister and the minister's government ensuring that they keep a clear focus on the importance of maintaining this growth and Inghams' opportunities to the state of South Australia?

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (Minister for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries, Minister for Forests, Minister for Regional Development, Minister for Tourism, Minister for the Status of Women) (15:07): I thank the honourable member for his most important question. Indeed, the chicken industry is a very important industry in South Australia, not just in terms of the chicken meat but also our egg industry as well. Both industries, like many of our primary industries, have been faced with significant challenges over the last number of years, particularly in relation to the cost of imports going up and our very troubled economic climate. There have been problems with exports, given our dollar, and this has put a number of our primary industries under pressure, including our chicken industry.

To the best of my knowledge, the industry has not raised any specific concerns with me about the potential sale. I have met with a number of different people and delegations from the chicken industry on various occasions and had various discussions. They have brought me up to date on the sorts of issues and challenges they are facing. Obviously there are global factors operating that we do not have much control over. However, there are a number of things that this government is doing to assist, not just in terms of the chicken industry, but generally. One of them is the Mid Murray to Coorong corridor in the Murraylands. Recently I had the pleasure of launching a mapping report. That report was a consolidation of a wide range of different information that was brought together into one report.

The aim of this was to provide a readily accessible map, if you like, for potential future investors, particularly primary industry investors, so that people could come along and they could see how productive soils were, their climate profiles, where power mains were supplied, where water mains existed, where water storage facilities were—a wide range of different factors that are key to existing industries being able to make informed decisions about expanding and also to potential new investors coming in and being able to plan the best place to position their investment. That was the first of those plans that we have rolled out. PIRSA intends to provide one of these reports for each of our regions to assist in the planning for future investment.

As I said, there are a number of various means that we are looking at. We currently have a regional development infrastructure grants fund that provides assistance to industries that want to expand or develop their businesses and a number of other support facilities as well. As I have said, it is a very important industry to us. We are monitoring that very carefully and we will continue to work with that industry to try to assist them in meeting their future challenges.