farmers must be central to food security plan

With food security now firmly on the Federal election agenda, it is critical to ensure that keeping farmers on the land is central to the strategy, the Australian Greens today.

The Greens are troubled that the food security plan is in danger of becoming all about consumers and food affordability without recognising the critical importance of continuing to produce food here in Australia.

"Food security is not just about consumer prices and consumer choice - it has to be about keeping farmers on the land and preserving our agricultural land," Australian Greens Deputy Leader, Senator Christine Milne, said.

"Everywhere I go across Australia, in cities and in regional areas, people are telling me they want fresh, local, seasonal food and they want to support our farmers to produce it. This is what is behind the tremendous growth in farmers' markets across the country.

"Farmers need to receive a decent return for the food they grow. Instead, they are constantly subject to the downward pressures placed on them from cheap overseas imports and the Coles and Woolworths duopoly.

"Farmers are at a distinct disadvantage in trying to negotiate a decent price for their product with powerful processors and supermarkets.

"Governments are letting both the community and farmers down by signing up to free trade agreements that discriminate against Australian farmers, by refusing to reinstate anti-price discrimination provisions in the Trade Practices Act, by distorting the price of land with ill-thought out tax incentives like managed investment schemes and by prioritising coal over agriculture.

"In developing a food security plan, we have to prioritise the ability of our land and water to sustain agriculture and the development of policy settings that deliver a decent return to farmers so that they can stay on the land.

"With an aging farming population, there is a desperate need to find ways for young people to go on the land and be able to afford to buy land. They are now competing with agribusiness and often overseas corporate interests.

"There is a real danger that, if the debate focuses exclusively on lowering food prices to the consumer, we will see Australian producers closed down because they can't compete with cheaper food from overseas produced in environmentally and socially damaging ways.

"The short-sighted strategy of focussing on cheaper food from overseas leaves Australia completely vulnerable to the whims of overseas food producers and availability in a world increasingly challenged on food security.

"The plan must build in the impacts of climate change and peak oil from the start. These two crises will have a massive impact on agriculture and cannot be swept under the carpet."