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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2024-02-21 Daily Xml
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Primary Industries Scorecard

The Hon. M. EL DANNAWI (14:38): My question is to the Minister for Primary Industries and Regional Development. Would the minister update the council about the results of the 2022-23 Primary Industries Scorecard?

The Hon. C.M. SCRIVEN (Minister for Primary Industries and Regional Development, Minister for Forest Industries) (14:38): I thank the honourable member for her question. I would hope that members in this place would agree that our regions are enormous contributors to the state's economy and the latest Primary Industries Scorecard has further underlined this fact. The 2022-23 scorecard includes primary industry sectors such as field crops, livestock, horticulture, wine, seafood, dairy, forestry, wool, hides and skins, seeds and animal feed.

I am delighted to share with this place that South Australia's food, wine and agribusinesses have generated a record-breaking $18.5 billion in revenue in 2022-23. This includes South Australia's total value of direct international merchandise exports, net interstate trade and change in stocks increasing by 15 per cent from $12 billion in 2021-22 to $13.9 billion this past year.

The results of the scorecard show total employment in the primary industries sector is estimated to be 78,000, which is a 10 per cent increase on the previous year, and the contribution to gross state product from the primary industries sector in 2022-23 increased by an impressive 7 per cent.

The field crops sector, which includes wheat, barley, hay, canola, seeds and pulses, recorded particularly strong results, which saw revenue increase by 39 per cent up to $7.76 billion. Production was 74 per cent above the five-year average for the state and beat the previous crop production record of 11.1 million tonnes back in 2016-17.

Breaking down those results further, the production value increase was largely driven by the increase in the value of wheat, up 58 per cent, and barley, up 41 per cent. The top three importers of South Australian wheat in 2022-23 were Indonesia, to the value of $606 million; China, $290 million; and Yemen, $224 million. The biggest importers of South Australian barley were Saudi Arabia at $257 million, Qatar at $102 million and Vietnam at $93 million.

In addition to field crops, I am pleased to advise there were many other sectors that also recorded strong growth once again. The dairy industry recorded a 34 per cent increase in farmgate milk prices along with increased production and a rise in cheese exports. The seafood sector had a 5 per cent increase in value to $508 million, driven largely by price increases for southern rock lobster and southern bluefin tuna. Wool recorded an 8 per cent increase to achieve $549 million in revenue due to increases in export quantities and prices, and forestry enjoyed a 5 per cent increase, primarily attributed to the rise in the sale of wood products.

Improved farming practices have resulted in new and emerging sectors, products and markets, including plant-based protein, the establishment of a new industry in seaweed and the development of low and no-alcohol products. Another interesting fact that this year's scorecard showed is that, for the first time, Indonesia has surpassed China as the state's biggest export market for agriculture and food exports. We have also seen large increases in agricultural exports to India, up 182 per cent, and Thailand, up 131 per cent. The increase in agricultural export markets has resulted in more jobs in regional South Australia as well as in the metropolitan area.

The state government will continue to put in a lot of hard work to rebuild our relationship with China, something that was severely damaged under the previous federal Coalition governments. We hope that as our relationship with China continues to improve, we will see larger gains in the wine and seafood markets in particular and deliver stronger export gains going forward into the future. I look forward to continuing to be able to update this place on the further growth of the agricultural sector in South Australia as our regions continue to go from strength to strength.

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