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

My question is to the Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources. Will the minister update the House on how the government is providing vital support for drought affected regions throughout Australia in the industries that we rely on, and would another approach to the economy place farming communities at risk?

David Littleproud (Maranoa, National Party, Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for his question and his interest in this drought, a drought that is spreading like a cancer right across our country and now even into his own electorate in South Australia. That's why it's important that we as a federal government give a helping hand to one of the big economic lifters of our nation's economy. The agriculture sector contributes over $60 billion a year to our nation's economy, and that's why this government to date has committed up to $7 billion worth of support programs not only to the here and now but also into the future. We've done that not by having to increase taxes but actually at a time when we've reduced taxes. We've reduced taxes for small businesses, and those farmers themselves are small businesses who will take advantage of those tax cuts so that, when it does rain, they'll recover even more quickly and they'll be able to invest back in their properties and employ more people back on their farms, keeping those local communities going.

It has also allowed us, for the first time in this nation's history, to have a nationally coordinated drought approach, with a $5 billion centrepiece that will allow us to reinvest the dividends of that, every year after 2020 into research and development, into infrastructure. That's our job as a federal government—to put the environment and infrastructure around our people and let them grow, let them do the lifting. That's why we've already complemented the research and development with $300 million a year to allow our farmers to have the cutting-edge science and technology that makes them more productive and allows them to produce the best food and fibre in the world. Then we put the infrastructure around them, complemented with over a billion dollars on the table for water infrastructure, to drought-proof our nation, to build that productivity and profitability, coupled with $2 billion worth of Regional Investment Corporation loans to kickstart that drought-proofing across the nation.

Then we've gone deeper, to the farm gate. We're tackling pests and weeds, which cost the agricultural sector $5 billion a year. We are looking at things like exclusion fences to try and remove wild dogs. For the first time in decades, sheep are being brought back to these small regional communities. That brings shearers back, and invariably the shearer leaves some of their money at the pubs and servos and cafes in these regional communities.

We're also seeing environmental benefits. We're seeing for the first time in decades a return of koalas, brolgas and small marsupials. We're also making sure we're working with the best science with the Bureau of Meteorology, getting localised climate guides to give our farmers the tools, the equipment, to be able to make real-time decisions about their stocking density, about their cropping rotations, and making sure they've got the cutting-edge technology to ensure that their decisions make them the best money they possibly can, which flows back through their community. This is not only an investment in agriculture but also an investment in our nation.