Mark Coulton (Parkes, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the Primary Industries (Customs) Charges Amendment Bill 2013 and associated bills. I am pleased to support these pieces of legislation. Rural research and development has a great impact on the electorate of Parkes and the strong agricultural sector in that area. The innovations that come from our rural research and development corporations have been greatly useful to agriculture in Australia. It is important that we continue to pursue this innovation in order to increase our productivity. The RDC model is one that is envied across the world. The research and development corporations were established in 1989 and, I might add, were supported by my predecessor John Anderson when he was minister for agriculture. We have had gains through increased productivity for the last 24 years.

The federal government will provide around $250 million to research and development corporations in the current financial year. This money goes to the future of our agricultural sector. Starting in the next financial year, the government will allocate an additional $100 million in funding for rural RDCs. This recognises the good and important work that these research corporations undertake and also signals to the industry that this government is serious about supporting agriculture in Australia into the future. I would like to point out that, while not all research projects go on to be widely implemented, it is also vital that the research keep pushing the boundaries. This is where there are gains to be made in productivity.

These bills will allow the RDCs to meet the changing needs of the industries that they are there to support. The RDCs will now be able to undertake marketing activities at the request of the industry and where the industry agrees to raise a marketing levy. There has also been strong evidence that marketing in combination with R&D is particularly beneficial for an industry. Currently nine of the industry-owned RDCs undertake marketing, and this is a common-sense move by the government if an industry supports a marketing levy.

These bills encourage further voluntary private sector investment by RDCs by allowing the government to provide matched funding for voluntary contributions up to set limits. The money invested in R&D is paid back through productivity many times over, and we can see the benefits that R&D has brought to Australian agriculture over the years. At the moment only a few of the RDCs are able to receive government matched funding for voluntary contributions by business.

As one of our key election commitments, these bills will reduce the red tape burden on industry. One of the ways in which this will be done will be by removing product-specific maximum levy rates. This will allow RDCs to react more quickly to emerging trends and issues. There will also be changes to the statutory RDCs to streamline the board selection process and reduce the time cost of filling a vacancy. By reducing these costs of red tape, the RDCs will be able to focus more readily on research.

I would now like to acknowledge some of the innovations that have come about through the rural research and development corporations. The farmers in my electorate benefit directly from the research undertaken by a number of corporations. I might just say from my own background as a farmer, before I came to this place, I and my family have always been involved in undertaking research. In the late seventies when glyphosate was first discovered as an agricultural chemical, in conjunction with Monsanto and the New South Wales department of agriculture, my brothers and I undertook trialling in zero-till methods of farming. We were hampered in the early days because the equipment we were trying to use was not fully adapted to zero till. But those early results and the fact that something was done that had not been done before ultimately led through the work of many, probably mainly Jeff Esdaile from the University of Sydney's Livingston farm, to the development of a farming technique that has now revolutionised agriculture right across Australia and, indeed, the world. At another stage, through the New South Wales department of agriculture I was involved in water use efficiency studies. The experiment on our farm over a 12-month period, conducted from the research station at Tamworth, looked at the ability of the soil to conserve moisture over a longer period of time. So I think it is vital that we keep at the cutting edge.

One of my great frustrations in the six years that I have been here up to this point is that pretty well all the funding that has gone into agriculture for research and other things has come through the prism of climate change and, I think, a belief by the previous government that farmers were poor simple souls that needed the government to come and save them. I can remember numerous occasions when the previous minister for agriculture, the Hon. Tony Burke, would talk about helping farmers adapt to climate change. That statement really did show that former minister's complete lack of understanding of the agricultural sector.

Australian farmers are not following the world on these things, they are actually leading the world. The reality is that, in this last year, there was a wheat crop through eastern Australia that was grown on very, very minimal moisture. It was a crop that 30 years ago would have been a complete failure, but because of cutting-edge technology, agronomy and research, varieties through genetics and a whole range of other things, Australian wheat farmers this year have produced a crop where in previous years it would have been a failure.

This bill will go a long way to enhancing the abilities of Australian farmers in a range of things, whether it is in intensive livestock, poultry, pork production. An RDC has funded, with Alfa Laval, the development of a robotic dairy. Those things will bring efficiencies. So there is a whole range of things that will put Australia at the forefront. It was an election promise by the coalition that we would increase funding and focus on agricultural research. That is what farmers want. Our farmers are not looking to be helped out as if they are struggling third-class citizens. Our farmers are needing that assistance through government to keep them at the forefront of world production, and this bill does that.

I might close by commenting on comments that were made outside this place earlier this week from a well-known agriculturalist, expert in all things agricultural. He is the secretary of the Australian Workers Union, Paul Howes—apparently, he is an expert. He said that family farms are a thing of the past and that we should corporatise rural Australia. His ignorance on this issue is breathtaking.

There is a place for corporate farming, and indeed right throughout the Parkes electorate we have some large-scale industries, super funds and a whole range of people who have invested in agriculture. I can tell you right here and now that the most efficient, productive and progressive farmers in my electorate are the family farms. The larger family farms not only have a successful business model; they have a model of business and management that is lean, efficient, reactive, agile—those are all the things you need in running a farm.

Quite frankly, the family farms will still be leading the way in Australia long after corporates have come and gone. We have seen people come along who have made money elsewhere and they think: 'If these dopey famers can make money, what could a clever person like me do?' We see them come—I am sure in the seat of Maranoa we see them go, Mr Deputy Speaker Scott. The family farms are the ones that are here to stay.

In conclusion, I support this bill. It is a great honour to be in a government that is going to support research into agriculture. As a farmer previously and as a member of parliament that represents a third of the land mass of New South Wales, this is what the people of the bush are looking for. They do not want Big Brother looking over them; they want a hand to be kept at the forefront of agriculture as they have in the past. I recommend this bill to the House.

Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a pleasure to be here. I rise to speak on the three bills before the House, the Rural Research and Development Legislation Amendment Bill 2013, Primary Industries (Excise) Levies Amendment Bill 2013 and Primary Industries (Customs) Charges Amendment Bill 2013. It was good to listen to the previous speaker, the member for Parkes, talking about agriculture.

The rise of technology and scientific advancement in agriculture is inexorable. It has been the tool that has enabled Australian farmers to compete on a worldwide basis when many times there are impediments in front us—climate and cost of production—that would swamp a lesser country. We have been able to continue stepping up to the plate and, largely, because we have been the best at what we do in the world—if not the best, very close to it.

This bill refers to the 15 research development corporations and it expands their ability to increase opportunities and advancement of the industries they serve. In effect, it allows organisations that have as their primary role the technological advancement of their industries to use the synergies of those relationships to promote and grow the markets for their products.

I initially had some concerns that a move like this would dilute the research development corporations' ability to keep focus on pushing the scientific boundaries. Once the corporations become involved in marketing, I was somewhat concerned that that is where their resources might go; however, I have been advised that the firewalls put in place on the government and grower funds raised through industry levies are such that this type of leakage cannot happen, and in that case I support the legislation.

Mr Deputy Speaker, as you know, I come from a farming background. My biggest interaction with a research development corporation in the past has been with the GRDC, the Grains Research & Development Corporation. At one stage I sat on a GRDC link group, and I spent 10 years on the Minnipa Agricultural Centre committee, now the Eyre Peninsula Agricultural Research Foundation, a grower-driven and grower-influenced organisation that works with the Minnipa Agricultural Centre. I spent the last two years before I entered parliament as the chairman of that organisation.

Minnipa is one of the last significant dryland demonstration farming properties owned by a state government left in Australia. It is a SARDI, South Australian Research and Development Institute, facility which regularly accesses GRDC project grants to fund its research work. The GRDC—like other RDCs—is funded largely by grower levies and, in the case of the GRDC, levies are just on one per cent, 0.99 per cent, of the sale value of the grain, which comes to around about $2.50 per tonne on average, or about $80 million a year. This, in turn, is being matched by the Commonwealth government. The current revenue forecast is based on a wheat production of 25.7 million tonnes and a production of nine million tonnes for 2012-13, with the revenue estimate to be $172.5 million and the operating expenditure to be almost $181 million. As part of the coalition's election pledge to agricultural Australia, we will be raising the government contribution from a dollar-for-dollar to a $1.25-per-dollar contribution. This significant increase in funding will make a real difference in the research community.

I am often asked, 'What can we do with agriculture?' We have farmers under pressure and stress from many sides—skyrocketing input costs; fertiliser, machinery, labour, fuel and chemicals, all added to international competition—and sometimes, it is a little hard for farmers to be positive. But we should be. We should be very positive about the future of agriculture in Australia. The demand for food and fibre is going to explode, and our clean green industry will be at the forefront of supplying this demand—that is, if we give the industry the tools to be so.

The answer is quite simple: what we need to do for our farmers to continue to compete is to continue to raise our productivity. And we may well ask, how? How do we increase productivity? Many farmers ask this question. But history says that we will. And history also says that the answers will come from superior technology. The answers won't come from working harder; they will come from working smarter.

My family took land up at Buckleboo, which is on the northern edge of the cropping regions of the eastern Eyre Peninsula, in 1926, and at its peak the property provided income for the best part of five families. Roughly the same area now would support possibly one-and-a-bit labour units. However, total production has risen by at least a factor of 10 in that time—over the 80 years, almost 90 years. The production coming off that unit of land has risen about tenfold. This is a great outcome for agriculture, and it is an even better story for Australia because it is these efficiencies that underwrite the standard of living in greater Australia—for all Australians.

While farmers work hard, in simple effort terms, these dramatic increases in productivity have not come from working harder, they have come—as I said before—from working smarter—that is, simply, the delivery of new technology and new science.

It is worthwhile reflecting on who the beneficiaries of these dramatic productivity increases are. It is certainly not the country communities, which continue to suffer serious decline. In fact, the success of our productivity increase has worked to undermine the future of our country communities, because Australian farmers will grow more products every year using fewer people. It is certainly not the farmers in particular who are the beneficiaries.

We know the decline in farming numbers continues, so it cannot be the farmers that are really benefiting from this productivity. It seems to me that the biggest winners are the population at large—or even, I could say, our Australian cities—because efficient agriculture drives people to the city seeking employment. It frees them up to produce in other industries for the national benefit. It is the sign of a civilised and advancing community that fewer people are employed providing the basics of life and more people are employed providing the luxuries of life, the services of life. So that productivity increase in rural Australia is what drives the very high standard of living the population of Australia in general enjoys, but these are some of the very things that challenge the liveability of our local communities.

The money earned for Australia by exporting an ever-increasing tonnage of our agricultural bounty in turn flows down through the economy and provides jobs and affluence for millions of Australians. That is why the government support for the research organisations is not support for a single industry but has an enormous multiplier effect that benefits everyone.

While the picture I have painted about regional communities looks a little gloomy for Australia, let me tell you that the alternative—that is, not to have an aggressive, well targeted and well funded research capacity—is to invite disaster. Australian agriculture has always traded on its relative efficiency in the world—and nothing has changed. For agricultural industries to survive and thrive in a high-cost environment, we must be the best, or nearly the best, in the world. The rest of the world is improving rapidly and we will need to keep up an intense effort.

I continue to focus my remarks mainly on the grains industry because, quite simply, that is the industry I know the best. I spoke earlier about the productivity gains on my own property, and it is worth looking at the physical changes on the ground that have enabled this advance. I commenced farming in the seventies. I am thinking of the former minister for trade; yes, I was living in the seventies, and I do remember Skyhooks, but I will not be singing a song about it! We used to crop over one-third of the property and use long-term mechanical fallow to prepare the soil—we thought we were preparing the soil, but we were probably doing it a great amount of damage—and reduce weed intrusion. The advent of widespread fertilisers in the fifties and sixties had greatly boosted production and, by the early seventies, the advent of a wider range of in-crop chemicals enabled us to somewhat bring forward the planting dates and deal with the emerging issue of a broader range of weeds.

Then came perhaps the biggest revolution in broadacre farming—and we may not have realised how great it was at the time: the advent of the glyphosate molecule, commonly referred to as Roundup. It has totally changed farming as we know it all over the world. It has led to zero-till farming systems, which has virtually eliminated the massive soil erosion which had plagued our farming system since the 1930s—Australia was drifting away. I once had it put to me by a significant agriculturalist from Chile, who was visiting Australia at the request of the South Australian No-Till Farmers Association, that the bloke who invented the glyphosate molecule should be given the Nobel Peace Prize because people all over the world now had a far greater source of food as a result of that technical innovation; it is almost beyond description what that single chemical has done to agriculture worldwide.

It is interesting because there are many around who condemn the big chemical companies but, of course, advances at that level cannot be made without the millions of dollars needed for research to push this new technology through. This basic research was not done by Australia and it was not funded by our growers, though under the sophisticated patent systems which we adhere to in Australia we were able to contribute to the development of that chemical and consequentially the next generation of chemicals. Whole new tillage systems were invented around the advent of glyphosate and similar chemicals, which were driven by new science leading to a better understanding of soil borne diseases and the detrimental effects on production. This in turn has led to completely new cropping rotations and the ability to suspend what we in South Australia used to call 'ley farming', or resting, where farmers crop a paddock for one or two years and then leave it out for one or two years, and plant crops much more often; in fact, on a lot of properties we can plant 100 per cent of the property every year.

So in about 25 years we have gone from cropping a third to a half of our properties to actually cropping 100 per cent of our properties. It is like doubling the size of your farm. Much of the research has been funded by the registered development corporations or their predecessors, the taxpayers and of course the growers. But, boy, Australia has reaped the benefits. Complex fertiliser mixes have pushed the envelope further and the advent of precision agriculture, utilising centimetre accurate GPs-guided systems, has pushed it even further. There is no more overlap and wastage, with the ability to now plant between last year's crops, reducing disease, with variable rate sowing, matching fertiliser and chemical usage for soil type and productive capacity. In parallel, while all these advances have accumulated, there has been a continued and dramatic improvement in varieties of crops. A mate once said to me: 'You never want to underestimate the scientific value in that one little seed, the technological power of the advancement of plant breeding.'

Now we are on the cusp of a new revolution, with the tentative rollout in Australia—certainly tentative in South Australia—of genetically modified crops, which hold the promise of providing significant health benefits for all consumers, reducing our reliance on chemicals, improving yields and the ability to better manage crop rotation. It has been a revolution and it will continue.

In the past, every farmer thought we had reached the limit, but we have always found the next step. We can only do that if we continue to push the envelope. I took delivery of a new Massey 542 harvester in about 1979. It had a 21-foot front on it and the whole district visited my paddock to have a look at this monster. 'How would you ever see the ends at the front?' Now, they are more than twice that width, at 45 feet, yet we seem to have no problem and, importantly, there seems to be no limit.

The other half of the equation is marketing, finding our international edge and keeping the downward cost pressure on the path to market and finding the premium for our product and, under this amending legislation, using the research and development corporations and their technical and scientific expertise to help construct the story. These bills will allow that to happen. It will deliver on our election commitments and it will help drive Australian farming to the next level.

Barnaby Joyce (New England, National Party, Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, for letting me move towards the summing up. The Rural Research and Development Legislation Amendment Bill 2013 updates and refines the Australian Research and Development Corporation model. In comparing the policy changes, the government met and consulted with stakeholders around Australia and took into account many submissions. Extensive consultation continued in the process leading up to these legislative amendments.

The bill will allow statutory R&D corporations to carry out marketing activities on behalf of their industries, if a marketing levy is in place. R&D corporations which undertake marketing will be able to use their industry expertise to provide cost-effective targeted marketing activities in accordance with industry needs and priorities. No charges to levy rates or new levies are part of these amendments.

The amending legislation aims to encourage private sector investment in rural R&D by extending to all R&D corporations the arrangements for government-matching funding to voluntary contributions for eligible R&D, up to legislated caps.

Statutory funding agreements for statutory R&D corporations are proposed to drive performance improvements and increase transparency in the delivery of R&D services. Funding agreements have been a flexible mechanism for providing government guidance and oversight to industry-owned R&D corporations. These amendments will extend that mechanism to statutory R&D corporations.

Amendments in the bill change the process for selection of statutory R&D corporations' board directors to improve transparency and efficiency. The amendments promote due consideration of diversity in the selection process. These amendments aim to ensure higher quality boards for R&D corporations and reduce the time and delay associated with securing them.

The bill proposes to allow the collection and matching of individual fisheries industry levies subject to a cap based on the gross value of production of that individual fishery. This will allow specific fisheries to propose levies to invest in R&D for their industry and to undertake marketing in a similar way to other rural commodities. The burdensome requirement for ministerial approval of statutory R&D corporations' annual operating plans will be removed and other minor technical matters addressed.

The Primary Industries (Excise) Levies Amendment Bill 2013 removes the maximum levy rates for R&D and marketing levies on primary industry products. Similarly, the Primary Industries (Customs) Charges Amendment Bill 2013 removes the maximum charge rates for R&D and marketing changes that are duties of customs. The numerical maximum levy and charge rates will be removed and the rates will be limited to no more than the levy recommendation by an industry body following consultation with the levy and charge payers. The amendments will not change any levy or charge rates that are in operation at that moment, but they will streamline the process for changing rates in the future. Levies and charges may be increased following a request by industry but will not be allowed to be set above the rate recommended by industry. This will allow industry to manage their collective investments in research and marketing whilst also providing a safeguard for levy payers against arbitrary increases to rates. I commend the bills to the chamber.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced.

Ordered that this bill be reported to the House without amendment.