David Littleproud (Maranoa, National Party, Minister for Agriculture, Drought and Emergency Management) Share this | Hansard source

Can I thank the member for Mallee for her question. The electorate of Mallee is one of the agricultural engine rooms of this nation, producing some of the best grain, grapes and citrus, and is in fact taking advantage of the free trade agreements we put around our primary producers in order to reach that $100 billion goal by 2030.

We all have a role to play in that. As a government, we do as well. We're signing up to that, not only in the here and now and supporting our farmers through some of the worst natural disasters we have seen, the fires and the drought. Over $2 billion is committed for the recovery from fires, and there is the $8 billion in commitments for the drought, ensuring we kick-start the recovery when the rains do come. Rain has come, and, while it is pleasing to see, one shower of rain doesn't break the drought. We will continue to support our farmers through our national drought strategy, through the three pillars: supporting our farmers in the here and now, giving them respect and the dignity of putting food on the table; but also, under the second pillar, supporting the communities that support them and understanding that this drought extends past the farm gate into the communities that support them; and the third pillar is looking to the future. We are the first government to look to the future and understand that the next drought starts the very next day after the rain stops. I am proud to say that last night we tabled, under the Future Drought Fund, a $5 billion investment paying a $100 million dividend every year. Last night we tabled that plan to be implemented on 1 July: a pay-down of $100 million a year to build resilience and kick-start the recovery of agriculture from one of the worst droughts in our nation's history.

But we are not stopping there. We have also made a $3 billion commitment to the states, who have the constitutional responsibility, to go and dig the holes, to plumb the nation, to get the water infrastructure, to drive the growth. We are not shirking our responsibility. We are saying, 'We will go hand in hand with you, with over $3 billion.' But we are saying to them, 'Get moving, because that $100 billion target can only be met with water.' We are going further than that. Our farmers understand more than anyone that the health of the environment and of their land is intrinsically tied to their profit and loss. We're creating a biodiversity stewardship fund to reward our farmers for the good stewardship of their land. They should be rewarded for that.

We're also making sure that we are making one of our biggest investments in one of the biggest assets we have: the precious human capital of people in rural and regional Australia. We've had a generation of young people drained out of rural and regional Australia because agriculture wasn't popular. But it is sexy again. We will create another pillar of agriculture by modernising our research and development to bring our young people home to take up the new jobs in agriculture and understand that they play a significant part in agriculture's future of driving to $100 billion by 2030. We have faith and confidence in agriculture but, more importantly, we have faith and confidence in regional and rural Australia.

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