Food & Farming

What will Australian farmers be growing in 5- 10 years time?

I watched Part 3 of Two Men in a Tinnie * on ABC TV last night. It’s about environmentalist Tim Flannery and TV personality John Doyle motoring down the Darling and Murray Rivers in a small aluminum boat.

They have met lots of people along the river but haven’t yet interviewed a rice or cotton farmer while often complaining about these crops. In Parts 1 and 2 they reminisced about the days when farmers grew sheep rather than cotton.

A couple of years ago I wrote that:

“It is [Peter] Cullen’s contention that we can save water in the Murray–Darling Basin by growing higher value crops, in particular wine grapes. And there are those who insist that rice growing should be banned altogether. While concerned greens may be keen to sip champagne for breakfast, rather than crunch rice bubbles—all in the name of doing the right thing by the environment— is this really a sustainable approach?”

I went on to explain in that article that…

“One of the most defining characteristics of water in the Australian landscape is flow variability. In the poem ‘My Country’, Dorothea McKellar appropriately describes Australia as a land ‘of drought and flooding rains’. Reflecting this variability, water allocation can be severely restricted in drought years like the present, even though water storage capacity in the Murray Darling Basin is approximately 25 per cent of annual average runoff.

Paradoxically, rice growers easily cope with this by simply not planting a crop. In contrast, South Australian wine grape growers bleat loudly because their perennial crop needs water every year.”

Just yesterday I read Rabobank bank boss, Bert Heemskerk, stating that northern hemisphere farm subsidies ‘have to go’ and that this would lead to lead to an inevitable shift in global agricultural production from the northern hemisphere to the south.

The Pharmland website also suggests that Europe, in particular that Denmark, should lessen its dependence on massive EU agricultural subsidies and fostered a freer global market, allowing Third World countries to enter the market and begin self-sustaining economies. The site goes on to suggest that Denmark farmers begin to cultivate high value GM crops including vaccine-laden tomatoes.

At the opposite end of the spectrum is the potential increased production of low value GM crops for ethanol.

David Tribe wrote in the IPA Review last year that:

“Already, Brazilian fuel ethanol has become a substantial part of international trade, and currently competes commercially on US fuel markets, even with the penalty of a 51 per cent US excise tax. This dominant global trade position in ethanol liquid-fuel capitalises on 30 years of previous technological improvement, including earlier introduction of higher yielding cane varieties and numerous integrated changes to ethanol factories.

The recent wave of ethanol fuel ventures in Australia cannot afford to ignore the reality of markets dominated by very cheap Brazilian ethanol and the prospects of even lower priced Brazilian and US ethanol in the near future.

Cereal straw and sugar cane bagasse are not the only cellulosic starting materials which can be converted to sugar using enzyme catalysts: wood and many other non-food crops can also be used, and forest industries in Canada and Scandinavia have particular interests in this area.

…Ethanol biofuel doesn’t make economic or environmental sense without the tools and discoveries of modern biotechnology.

Without this, Australia would be better off importing its fuel ethanol from South America.

Setbacks to farm profitability and investment caused by GM crop bans show that technological leadership entails much more than just science and the costing of economic returns and agronomic benefits. They represent destruction of basic economic freedoms and threats to the medium term financial viability of several rural industries. Resolution of this damage might come from a frank assessment of the misjudgements of industry, farming groups, and politicians that caused them, as well as an action plan to change stakeholder strategies.

If it is indeed true that they were driven by political calculations about urban votes rather than government attention to the interests of the rural sector, stronger activism by farming organizations, such as the National Farmers Federation and other networks such as the recently established Producers Forum (which is a loose national network of concerned growers), are a very welcome sign.”

But not everyone is so optimistic. Last week I received an email from Aaron Edmonds with a link to a piece in The Daily Star that began:

“The Furnace Australia sailed into Chennai recently carrying a load of wheat and, some warned, ill tidings. India’s first wheat imports in six years marked a reversal in the march toward “food independence” that the country began in the 1970s.

In the piece Jason Overdorf goes on to suggest that Indian agriculture is in trouble, too reliant on technology and running out of water:

“Swaminathan urges leaders to focus on what he calls an ‘evergreen revolution’. The goal would be to correct the damage wrought by the first Green Revolution: adopting new methods like the use of natural predators instead of chemicals to eliminate pests, and switching to organic fertilizers and more efficient drip irrigation. He also says Singh should promote crops that require less water, including native Indian grains such as finger millet (ragi), pearl millet (bajra) and sorghum (jowar).

That’s a tough sell for two reasons: these coarse grains, once a staple of regional Indian cuisines, have fallen out of style since the first Green Revolution made wheat cheap and plentiful. So restoring their popularity will take a major marketing push, of the kind governments rarely do well. Second, Singh sees India very differently from the critics, as a nation fighting to attain middle-class comfort, not one at risk of sliding into mass hunger. Watch the future voyages of the Furnace Australia, and whether it is carrying grain to India, for one strong sign of which view is right.

But i’ts hard for me to reconcile the claim that Indian agriculture is in trouble with reports that cotton yields are up?

Indeed world cotton production is projected at 25 million tons in 2006/07 with China (Mainland), India and Pakistan combined expected to produce 13 million tons in 2006/07, or over half of world production for the first time in history.

Again, according to David Tribe in that piece from last year’s IPA Review:

“Modern plant breeding is playing decisive role in this economically disruptive but beneficial-to-the consumer transition. The continuing global progress with this revolution, which started in Australia and the US in 1996, is illustrated by recent comments made by Zhang Rui, a member of a research team in the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. In September this year, he announced that China has approved commercialization of a new hybrid variety of insect-resistant Bt cotton—which contains a protein that kills bollworms—that should yield 26 per cent more cotton. The last two seasons have also witnessed truly dramatic improvements in the
Indian cotton industry productivity.

Widespread use of genetically modified cotton seeds has helped assure India of a bumper 2005 cotton harvest, with national output estimated at 25 million bales, up seven per cent from 2004.”

Back to that original question: What will Australian farmers be growing in 5- 10 years time?

Will the demand for ethanol (in Australia and overseas), lifting of the bans on GM food crops, lifting of agricultural subsidies in Europe, relative competitiveness of Asian farmers, or the availablility and price of water, be the most significant drivers of change?

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* I’ve noted Luke’s request that I comment on this series. I’m working up to a long blog post pointing out the difference between the rhetoric and the imagery.

I have some sympathy for the farmers of Nyngan and Cobar in New South Wales and the newly formed Regional Community Survival Group in their struggle to manage invasive woody weeds. I have posted some information from this group, including a note on the recent blockade.

I have less sympathy for NSW Farmers Association and their new campaign “Get Off Our Backs”. The NSW Farmers Association never stood up to the Wentworth Group and they went along with the Greenpeace anti-GM canola campaign.

I detail my thoughts on the issue in my latest column in The Land:

“I hope NSW Farmers Association’s new campaign intended to improve the image of farmers with the slogan “Get off our backs” resonates in Sydney. But I doubt it.

The association’s website explains that the community “has been misled on green issues for too long. It’s time for the truth.”

So what is the truth?

The way a lot of people see it, just a year ago NSW Farmers was asking for drought aid.

Remember the 2000-strong drought rally in Parkes? It generated lots of interest in Sydney with stories about desperate farmers, dust and hungry animals.

Unfortunately, through the years these stories have reinforced a perception that many Australian farmers are environmental vandals flogging a dry landscape.

If farmers want governments off their back, they must realise Australia is a land of drought and flooding rains and not keeping claiming exceptional circumstances.

There is some concern at the moment about the Wilderness Society and its “Can’t find a billabong ‘cos they’ve bulldozed the Coolabah trees” campaign.

But in terms of long-term damage to the reputation of Australian farmers this campaign pales into insignificance next to the National Farmers Federation (NFF) campaign of 2000-2001. Back then NFF executive director, Wendy Craik, pleaded for a massive $65 billion to stop the spread of dryland salinity and repair 200 years of damage from claimed unsustainable European farming practices.

Not a month goes by now without a newspaper headline telling how bad it is in the bush.

On federal budget night, Federal Treasurer, Peter Costello, announced another $500 million for the Murray River to reduce salinity levels — the centre-piece of the Government’s commitment to saving the Australian environment.

I was hoping some farm leader might have seized the initiative and issued a media releasing explaining that salt levels in the Murray are at historic lows and they don’t need to be artificially pushed any lower, but instead there was silence.

Last week I read how water levels in the Murray River are the lowest since records began more than 100 years ago.

But the article was confusing low water inflows with low water levels, the journalist apparently unaware that the Murray River ran dry in 1914.

In this drought, South Australian irrigators are receiving 80 percent of their water entitlements thanks to the dams and weirs upstream in NSW and Victoria, and the river is full of water all the way to South Australia.

The latest false claims about the Murray’s record low water levels also gave the ABC another opportunity to suggest agriculture is in trouble and lament yet another catastrophe in rural Australia.

If NSW farmers are going to have long-term success with their campaign, “Get off our backs”, then farm leaders need to try harder to correct such misinformation.

City dwellers would be surprised at how much they’ve been misled by the environment lobby (not to mention how many more trees there are now than at the time of European settlement), but more farmers will need to take more responsibility for their own businesses come drought or flood.

It’s no good telling people to leave you alone if they honestly believe, or have been hoodwinked into believing, you are wrecking the environment.“

I recieved the following note from Aaron Edmonds, 2002 Nuffield Scholar and Farmer:

“Agriculture has evolved to the assumption that oil and gas will always be cheap. Large amounts of energy are used in food production making agriculture the third largest energy consuming sector globally. Most people would be aware of the diesel fuel requirement to power the machinery used in crop production. What they would not be aware of is that diesel use is only a small component of the total energy demand in this process. In fact it is in the manufacture of fertilizers used to fuel crop growth where the largest energy liability occurs. To put it into perspective, it takes the energy from roughly one litre of oil to produce one kilogram of urea, the most widely used nitrogen fertilizer. Not to mention the petrochemicals and energy required for herbicide and pesticide manufacture. Agriculture will continue to incur fertilizer, pesticide and fuel cost increases proportional to rises in oil and gas prices. Quite clearly as energy concerns begin to emerge, agriculture must reduce its dependency on energy.

There are three areas in which total energy demand can be significantly reduced in Australian broadacre agriculture and not surprisingly these also bring sustainability gains almost as an added bonus. Sustainability it seems in the true sense of the word, simply means turning agriculture from a net energy user to a significant net energy producer!

Firstly it is highly desirable that crops be perennial in their growth habit. This means they survive from one year to the next and only need planting once. This saves on the need for heavy agricultural equipment and the diesel currently needed to sow common staple food crops like wheat, rice and corn on a yearly basis. The environmental gains from a perennial plant are a large root system preventing soil erosion, enabling use of subsoil moisture to prevent salinity and allowing deep access to leached fertilizers and nutrients. Perennial plants are also far more competitive with weeds.

Secondly there must be a legume base to the crop production system. Legumes are plants that enable nitrogen to be biologically fixed around their root systems and hence have no need for man made fertilizers to satisfy nutrition. Some common legumes include soybeans, peas, beans, chickpeas and lentils. The energy savings in legume based systems from requiring no nitrogen fertilizer are enormous. All natural plant ecosystems have a legume base within them which are the drivers of fertility.

Thirdly, in conventional agriculture, herbicides, fungicides and pesticides are required to control pests and diseases. These are produced with complex and energy expensive industrial processes quite often using petrochemical precursors. As our crops have been bred to focus almost completely on yield and not on traits that allow them to tolerate and compete with pests and weeds, man has insured productivity is linked to the high use of chemical inputs. This effectively means that the energy required for pest and disease control in the plant is ultimately sourced from fossil fuels. Whereas wild plants and wild relatives of our commercialized crops have developed unique means to survive pests and compete with other species.

Ironically it is a native plant that has not been exposed to modern man’s short sighted breeding efforts that offers Australian farmers the ability to greatly reduce energy dependency in food production. Australian sandalwood (Santalum spicatum) is a unique native tree crop highly adapted to Australia’s harsh conditions. The tree produces nuts that are high in oil (60%) and protein (18%) with the kernel oil being largely monounsaturated (55%) – the healthiest of oils. It requires no nitrogen fertilizer inputs as it is hemi-parasitic. It hosts on the root systems of native legumes such as Acacia’s sourcing nitrogen needs that are biologically fixed. The sandalwood nut will be an important oilseed crop in the future.

Trials for this dryland tree crop are underway at Aaron Edmonds’ farming property east of Calingiri in the Western Australian Wheatbelt. He has been making selections from local trees for large seededness and has varieties whose nuts are as large as a 20c piece. Four year old trees in his plantings are yielding well in excess of 1kg per tree, with this yield set to increase as the trees grow bigger. A planting density of 600 trees per hectare in a 350mm rainfall zone, could lead to a yield on a per hectare basis of around 600kg. The major energy cost in this system being weed control and harvesting, still significantly well below that of wheat production.

Plantings will continue on the Edmonds property who are quite probably becoming the world’s first broadacre producers to achieve significant energy efficiencies in food production. 50 hectares are earmarked for 2006 on top of the 30 hectares already established. Poorer soil types such as sands over gravel and areas prone to frost are being targeted first. These are the areas where energy investments in the form of fertilizer and herbicides are generally the highest risk.

Such oilseed crops as the sandalwood are essential to the future farm landscape, allowing farmers to profit rather than pain from the energy market and also to achieve energy self sufficiency in food production. Aaron’s vision is to see significantly more plantings of this amazing production system throughout the Wheatbelt.”

Greg Bourne, CEO of WWF Australia, has predicted that we will run out of food in 40 years as we run out of water. Aaron Edmonds, a wheat farmer in Western Australia, elaborating on a recent prediction from Lester Brown, Earth Policy Institute, thinks it will be much sooner:

“This year’s world grain harvest is projected to fall short of consumption by 61 million tons, marking the sixth time in the last seven years that production has failed to satisfy demand. As a result of these shortfalls, world carryover stocks at the end of this crop year are projected to drop to 57 days of consumption, the shortest buffer since the 56-day-low in 1972 that triggered a doubling of grain prices.” Lester Brown of the Earth Policy Institute.

This is assuming Australia pulls in a 36 million tonne grain harvest which at the moment looks unlikely to crack 10 million with Western Australia, Victoria and Queensland in dire trouble. NSW has recently received rains but has no subsoil moisture and South Australia has had a good start but will be needing rains very soon.

We know that India has had problems with its wheat crop this year importing 3.5 million tonnes, the first time it has imported any grain since 1999. China has just become a net importer of corn despite prediction this would not occur until next year.

There will be food shortages within 5 years in affluent countries. The question society needs to ask itself is this. Just how do we propose to reinvigorate the rural sector now we have almost brought it to its knees by bankrupting social and intellectual capital, discouraging investment, and offering meager reward for the great spoils of a rich culinary rersource base. Pigs eating out of a trough rarely give thought to where the next meal will come from. Are humans any different?”

Aaron Edmonds

I’m not so pessimistic. Here’s a graph from the Lester Brown report:

[Graph from World Food Stocks Fall to 57 Days of Consumption, Earth Policy Institute, click here]