Pasture dieback confirmed on NSW North Coast

According to the NSW Department of Primary Industries:

Pasture dieback is a condition killing large areas of sown and native summer growing pasture in Queensland. The size of areas affected varies. It starts as small patches and can spread to affect large areas. In some cases whole farms have been affected. It is not limited by landscape or soil type. Livestock avoid grazing these areas making them unproductive. 

Pasture dieback was first identified in Central Queensland and has now spread from Far North Queensland to the NSW border. Suspected pasture dieback was reported on a property in northern NSW in autumn 2019.

Figure 1: Small patch of dieback affected pasture. Photo: S J Baker

Sown species known to be affected include:

• Buffel grass (Cenchrus ciliaris)
• Digit grass (Digitaria eriantha)
• Rhodes grass (Chloris gayana)
• Green and Gatton panic (Megathyrsus maximus)
• Bambatsi panic (Panicum coloratum)
• Kikuyu (Pennisetum clandestinum)
• Paspalum (Paspalum dilatatum and P. plicatulum)
• Creeping bluegrass (Bothriochloa insculpta)
• Sabi grass (Urochloa mosambicensis)
• Signal grass (Brachiaria decumbens syn. Urochloa decumbens)
• Para grass (Brachiaria mutica syn. Urochloa mutica)
• Setaria (Setaria sphacelata)
• Purple pigeon grass (Setaria incrassata)
• Forest bluegrass (Bothriochloa bladhii ssp. glabra)
• Indian couch (Bothriochloa pertusa)

Other species known to be affected include:

• Black spear-grass (Heteropogon contortus)
• Forest bluegrass (Bothriochloa bladhii)
• Golden beard grass (Chrysopogon fallax)
• Giant rat’s tail grass (Sporobolus pyramidalis)

There are potentially more grass species that could be affected.

On 9 April 2010 The Daily Examiner and The Northern Star reported:

The first NSW case of pasture dieback, which kills sown and native summer growing grasses, has been identified on the state’s North Coast.

Producers should contact NSW Department of Primary Industries or the Exotic Plant Pest hotline, 1800 084 881 if they suspect their pasture has the condition.

NSW DPI Pasture Systems development officer, Sarah Baker, said it’s important to identify where pasture dieback is occurring to determine its spread and impact.......

“Pasture dieback causes summer growing grasses to turn yellow and red, become unthrifty and eventually die.

“Cases of suspected pasture dieback were reported during the 2018-19 summer, but with drought masking the condition, confirmation was impossible at the time.

“Recent rainfall has assisted us in identifying dieback, which previously had been found only in Queensland.” It has been estimated the affected area in Queensland is at least 200,000 hectares and could cover up to 4.4 million hectares, with the cause still to be confirmed.

The size of areas affected varies. It starts as small patches and can spread to affect large areas.

In some cases whole farms have been affected.

While control options remain dependant on identification of the cause, producers can continue to maintain production with broadleaf species, including legumes and brassicas, which are not affected by dieback. Re-sowing perennial grasses into dieback affected areas is not recommended. However, annual winter growing forages, including oats and dual-purpose cereals can help fill winter feed requirements.

NSW DPI is working with the Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, University of Queensland, Queensland University of Technology and industry, through Meat & Livestock Australia, to explore the cause of the condition.

As researchers work to better understand pasture dieback, including investigations of insect involvement, NSW DPI is developing options for future management. More information is available from the NSW DPI website www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/agriculture/pastures-and-rangelands/establishment-mgmt/pests-and-diseases/pasture-dieback.

The changing face of livestock sales in the NSW Northern River region

The Daily Examiner, 3 April 2020:

For the first time, online bidding of cattle took place at the Northern Rivers Livestock Exchange this week.

Using StockLive, buyers could bid for weaners through the online portal in the comfort of their own home. The timing couldn’t be better.

NRLX operations manager Brad Willis confirmed livestock sales would continue at the Casino saleyards with only essential staff, agents and registered buyers permitted on-site.

He said he was actively working to ensure the continuity of business while taking into account the public health consequences of the COVID-19 situation.

Victoria has cancelled live cattle sales but NRLX has no plan to follow suit. Mr Willis said it would stay open as long as it complied with the rules.

“The NRLX is a vital cog in the food supply chain and we need everyone’s co-operation to ensure the facility can operate for as long as possible,” Mr Willis said.

“If everyone uses common sense, we’ll get through.”There were 258 viewers and 27 registered buyers online for the sale.

ABC News, 2 April 2020:

The Northern Rivers Livestock Exchange has reported its highest sale week in its history, with nearly $8.29 million in sales generated at the saleyards in Casino last week.

A total of 7,784 head of cattle were sold across three days of operations — the prime sale and the annual weaner sales — up from around 3,000 head last year totalling just under $3 million in sales for the same week.

The prolonged drought resulted in the tough market last year, but this year coronavirus delivered a different challenge with NRLX using StockLive to host an online auction for the first time since its $14 million upgrade.

North Coast, Mid-North Coast and Northern Tablelands to have access to over $48 million for bushfire recovery, including grants of up to $15,000 each for eligible farmers

Sunday, 24 November 2019

Joint media release with the Hon Gladys Berejiklian MP, Hon John Barilaro MP, and Hon David Elliott MP – Community recovery package for farmers, small businesses and non-profit organisations in NSW communities hit by bushfires

• $48.25 million North Coast, Mid North Coast and Northern Tableland recovery package
• This includes $18.25 million for Community Recovery Fund for community projects and mental health
• Recovery grants of up to $15,000 for farmers and small businesses

Farmers and small businesses on the North Coast, Mid North Coast and Northern Tablelands that were hit by the recent NSW bushfires can now access recovery grants of up to $15,000.

Minister for Natural Disaster and Emergency Management David Littleproud said the $15,000 grants would help bushfire affected communities get back to doing what they do best.

“Getting back to business is one of the best ways to bounce back,” Minister Littleproud said.

“This will make sure businesses can open and people are back to work sooner.

“When money flows around a community it can help to speed up the whole recovery.

“An $18.25 million Community Recovery Fund has also been set up for targeted community project grants and mental health support.

“The mental toll on the community, volunteers and emergency service staff can linger long after the fires and they will need ongoing support.

“In addition the targeted grants will be available for projects that help with the recovery and improve disaster resilience.”
Premier of New South Wales, Gladys Berejiklian said that the assistance package is a commitment from both governments to not only assist the long term recovery effort of bushfire affected communities, but also the farming and business sectors by making available recovery grants of up to $15,000 to eligible primary producers and small businesses.

“The impact to communities has been evident over the last few weeks, however the extent of the impact to our farming and business sectors has not been fully quantified as these bushfires continue to burn.

“We also know the emotional impact a disaster like this can have on communities which is why we are committing $4.05 million to mental health services,” Premier Berejiklian said.

New South Wales Deputy Premier, John Barilaro said regional New South Wales is going through a difficult time with the drought biting hard and ferocious bushfires across the state.
“This funding is an important step towards helping communities recover and we will do everything we can to help regional families rebuild for the long run,” Mr Barilaro said.

New South Wales Minister for Police and Emergency Services, David Elliott said the State and Federal Governments are working together to help communities impacted by the recent bushfires get back on their feet as soon as possible.

“The Community Recovery Fund and the recovery grants will be targeted across three regions that have been identified as the worst affected,” Minister Elliott said.

Assistance is being provided through the joint Commonwealth-State Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements.

To apply for a recovery grant, primary producers and small businesses should contact the NSW Rural Assistance Authority on 1800 678 593 or visit raa.nsw.gov.au. [my yellow highlighting]

Recovery grants are available in these local government areas: 

Armidale, Ballina, Bellingen, Byron, Clarence Valley, Coffs Harbour, Glen Innes Severn, Inverell, Kempsey, Kyogle, Lismore, Mid-Coast, Nambucca, Port Macquarie-Hastings, Richmond Valley, Tenterfield, Tweed and Walcha.

Eligibility to apply for grants can be checked here.

Farmers are obviously not happy with these disaster recovery funding arrangements.....

ABCNews, 25 November 2019:

Farmers say a joint New South Wales and Federal government bushfire recovery package is a fraction of what will be needed to recover from what they say resembles a war zone....

The NSW Farmers Association CEO Peter Arkle said the bushfires have destroyed about 26,000 kilometres of fencing and that repair bill alone was estimated at about $300 million.

"The scale of this recovery task is immense and so we'll be looking to all levels of government to continue to support farmers and regional businesses to take on what will be a mammoth recovery task."

Beef and soybean producers David and Carolyn Duff had 30 year's worth of infrastructure destroyed at their "Toorooka" property west of Kempsey on the Mid North Coast.

"I suppose we're grateful for any assistance that we get initially and the sooner we can access the money the better off for us personally," Mr Duff said.

"But really in the scheme of things I mean the $15,000 to our business is going to be only a drop in the big bucket.

"We're faced with a boundary fence, replacement cost of up $220,000 — that's a rough guess.

"Fifteen thousand dollars will only replace 1 kilometre of 17 kilometres that we've estimated that we've lost, and there's probably 80 per cent of it totally wiped out.

"There may be 20 per cent of it that we can resurrect, patch up but that's not counting infrastructure, fences, yards, sheds and all that sort of thing."

The couple estimated their business has suffered an overall loss of up to $1.2 million on the property.

"I mean we lost 60 head of cattle which had to be euthanased by the LLS [Local Land Services]," Mr Duff said.

"It was very sad and it was very traumatic, our cattle are our livelihood and as any beef producer knows he hates to lose one let alone that many all at once.

"I don't think that Canberra really gets the enormity of the devastation and the effect that it has had on people like us — grassroots mum and dad and the kids — cattle people."....

"Over my dead body": Nationals MP Hogan rejects Clarence River water diversion proposals

The Daily Examiner, 21 October 2019, p.3:

Page MP Kevin Hogan has weighed into the water debate, saying any diversion inland would be “over my dead body”.

With the long-debated issue of diversion has been gathering interest, the Nationals MP said he did not support any plans to put dams on the headwaters of the Clarence River system.

“Every study on a dam and diversion of waters from the Clarence River inland, has shown it to be economically and environmentally unfeasible,” Mr Hogan said.

“In fact, a diversion of water from the Clarence River inland would be over my dead body.”

Water shortages in northern NSW and southern Queensland have led a number of councils to call for an investigation into redirecting water from the Clarence as their dams come close to running empty.

Mr Hogan’s comments came as an increasing number of farmers call for long-term strategies to deal with the effects of drought and his National Party colleague Barnaby Joyce told those struggling to consider leaving the land.

Mr Joyce said those who had failed to make a profit in 10 years should consider their position after 200 farmers lost the $36,000 annual Farm Household Allowance.

While Mr Hogan would not be drawn on whether he agreed with the comments expressed by Mr Joyce, he said “we need to remain flexible” and pointed out how the Federal Government had been altering the allowance since its inception....

He said the changes to the allowance, introduced to Parliament last week, would help provide drought relief to those who had exhausted their four years on the FHA. “We have announced a lump sum payment as people roll off the Farm Household Allowance; $13,000 for couples and $7500 for singles,” he said. “The Bill will also make it easier for more farmers to access the payment by lifting the amount families can earn off-farm to $100,000 a year; and allow farmers to count income from agistment against their losses.”

NSW land clearing for agriculture now thought to exceed 27,100 hectares annually

The Guardian, 13 September 2019:

A highly secret government-commissioned review into skyrocketing rates of clearing of native vegetation for farming in New South Wales has been completed and is likely to add to simmering tensions between the Liberals and Nationals within cabinet.

The review, which was triggered when land clearing exceeded 20,000 hectares in less than a year, has been undertaken by the NSW Natural Resources Commission, an independent body, and is soon to be considered by cabinet.

It is investigating clearing rates since the new Biodiversity Conservation Act began in August 2017 and whether the Act is working to preserve biodiversity.

The NRC’s chief executive, Bryce Wilde, confirmed his agency had been asked by the premier to do the review on 14 January, just before the state election, and had handed the findings to the government six weeks ago.

It did not seek any public or industry submissions, although Wilde said the NRC had sought expert input from consultants, who signed confidentiality agreements.But the mention in an estimates committee on Friday was the first time it had become public. The NRC said the review was “cabinet in confidence” and had sought information from departments only.

The review – and what to do about the escalation of land clearing in NSW – will add to the tensions between the Liberals and Nationals over stewardship of the environment.

The Coalition partners are already at loggerheads over key policies including management of wild brumbies in national parks, water policy and calls by the Nationals to allow logging in the River Red Gum national park on the Murray.

This week the agriculture minister, Adam Marshall, whose seat covers much of northern NSW where the land clearing is occurring, flagged introducing a “regional code” for clearing in the north-west of NSW, saying the current laws were not working well for large-scale farming enterprises.

This was interpreted as a plan to further relax the rules for when farmers can clear without a permit – at least in this region.

Regional codes were foreshadowed in the Biodiversity Conservation Act and a pilot is being run near Walgett.

But the secret NRC review is likely to bolster the arguments of the environment minister, Matt Kean, and the senior portfolio minister, Rob Stokes, who are known to be deeply concerned about the rapid escalation of land clearing and its impact on biodiversity......

Lobby group giving farmers a bad name

The Guardian, 2 May 2019:

The Queensland farm lobby AgForce has deleted more than a decade worth of data from a government program that aims to improve water quality in the Great Barrier Reef, in response to state government moves to introduce new reef protection laws.

Guardian Australia revealed in June that the state’s auditor general had raised concerns that agriculture industry groups had refused to share data from the “best management practices” program due to privacy concerns.

In recent months, AgForce and others had campaigned against the imposition of new reef protection regulations, which set sediment “load limits” in reef catchments and impose new standards on farmers.

The proposed new laws, which have been introduced to state parliament, also include a provision to allow the environment minister to obtain data from agricultural groups……

The Queensland environment minister, Leeanne Enoch, told the Courier-Mail the decision flushed “so much work and the taxpayer dollars that have been supporting it out to sea”.

“AgForce often claims that they are true environmentalists but this decision is not the action of a group that wants to protect the environment,” she said.

The Queensland audit office last year found that the success of the best management practices program could not be properly measured because the agricultural groups that receive government funding would not provide data on whether producers had actually improved their practices.

“This detailed information is currently held by the industry groups,” the report said. “Despite this work being funded by government, the information is not provided to government due to privacy concerns from the industry.

“These data restrictions mean government does not have full visibility of the progress made and cannot measure the degree of practice change or assess the value achieved from its investment of public funds.

“This means that the reported proportion of lands managed using best management practice systems could be overstated.”

Est. 32 per cent of Australian farmers still haven't come to grips with the reality of climate change

ABC News, 31 March 2019:

When the Reserve Bank announced recently that it was factoring climate change into interest rate calculations, it underlined a mainstream acceptance of potential impacts for a warming planet.

Climate change now had economic consequences.

But resistance to the premise of human-induced climate change still rages, including in regional and rural communities, which often are the very communities already feeling its effects.

"When you look at the results of different surveys going back a few years, farmers were four times more likely than the national average to be climate change deniers," said Professor Mark Howden, director at the ANU's Climate Change Institute.

"That was about 32 per cent versus about 8 per cent for the population average."

So, why do so many people in regional and rural areas not believe in climate change?

ABC Central West's Curious project put that question to some experts, who say the answer has more to do with human nature than scientific reasoning.

Professor Matthew Hornsey from the University of Queensland has dedicated his academic career to understanding why people reject apparently reasonable messages.

"The metaphor that's used in my papers is around what we call cognitive scientists versus cognitive lawyers," he said.

"What we hope people do when they interpret science is that they weigh it up in an independent way and reach a conclusion.

"But in real life, people behave more like lawyers, where they have a particular outcome that they have in mind and then they selectively interpret the evidence in a way that prosecutes the outcome they want to reach.

"So you selectively expose yourself to information, you selectively critique the information, you selectively remember the information in a way that reinforces what your gut is telling you."

This is known as motivated reasoning — and online news source algorithms and social forums are only enabling the phenomenon, allowing for further information curation for the individual…..

Professor Hornsey says there is another force fanning the flames of distrust between the scientific and non-scientific communities.

"One thing that can be said without huge amounts of controversy is that there is a relationship between political conservatism and climate scepticism in Australia," he said.

To better understand this, the professor's research took him to 27 countries and found that for two-thirds of these, there was no relationship between being politically conservative and a climate science sceptic.

But Australia's relationship between the two trailed only the United States in strength of connection, he said.

"What we were seeing was the greater the per-capita carbon emissions of a country, the greater that relationship between climate scepticism and conservatism."

Professor Hornsey argues that per-capita carbon emissions is an indicator for fossil fuel reliance, which in turn creates greater stakes for the vested interests at play.

"When the stakes are high and the vested interests from the fossil fuel community are enormous, you see funded campaigns of misinformation, coaching conservatives what to think about climate change," he said.

"That gets picked up by conservative media and you get this orchestrated, very consistent, cohesive campaign of misinformation to send the signal that the science is not yet in."…..

Professor Hornsey believes current discourse can make farmers feel as though they are at the centre of an overwhelming societal problem, triggering further psychological rejection of the science.

"I feel sorry for farmers around the climate change issue, because this is a problem that has been caused collectively.

"Farmers are only a small part of the problem but they are going to be a huge part of the solution, so I think they feel put upon.

"They feel like they are constantly being lectured about their need to make sacrifices to adapt to a set of circumstances that are largely out of their control."

In 2010, in response to a drought policy review panel, the Commonwealth initiated a pilot of drought reform measures in Western Australia.

John Noonan from Curtin University led the program, which went on to have staggering success in converting not only participating farmers' attitudes to climate science, but also in restructuring their farm management models in response to a changing climate.

"First of all, when talking with farmers, we didn't call it the drought pilot — we used the name Farm Resilience Program," Mr Noonan said.

"If you go in to beat people up and have a climate change conversation, you get nowhere.

"We got the farmers to have conversations about changing rainfall patterns and continuing dry spells, rather than us telling them what to do.

"And they told us everything that we needed them to tell us for us to reflect that back to them and say, 'Well, actually, that's climate change'.

"If you take a very left-brain, very scientific approach to these matters, you are going nowhere, and what we used was very right-brain, very heart and gut-driven — and it worked."

Mr Evans agrees, underscoring the deeply personal connection farmers have to the land, its role in their business approach, and why the message must be managed psychologically rather than scientifically.

"Ultimately, for a farmer to confront the reality that this new climate might be permanent, requires them to go through the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance."

The full article can be read here.

Whitehaven Coal’s Vickery mine extension community consultation has farmers up in arms

Whitehaven Coal Vickery Forest coal mining operation, 2018

Maules Creek section of coal mining operation, 2018

Whitehaven Coal Limited is seeking planning permission to extend its existing mining infrastructure footprint approx. 22kms north of Gunnedah in north-west NSW, by adding a coal processing hub with an on site coal handling and preparation plant (CHPP), train load-out facility and rail spur line to service its open cut mines at Tarrawonga, Rocglen and Werris Creek.

Quite naturally local rural communities are concerned…….

The Northern Daily Leader, 5 October 2018:

The Greens have condemned NSW Planning Minister Anthony Roberts and called his decision to ignore the plea of drought-stricken farmers “the height of arrogance”.

The spraying follows comments Mr Roberts made to The Leader yesterday, where he referred to the 4000-page Vickery coal mine extension report as a “relatively short document”, as he knocked back the request of farmers for more time to read the submission.

Farmers say they are struggling to find time to read and understand the massive document, let alone write a response to it, when they are hand feeding cattle.

Greens resource spokesman Jeremy Buckingham wrote to Mr Roberts in September, seeking to extend the public consultation time from 42 days to 90 days, however is yet to receive a response.

“Minister Anthony Roberts has displayed the height of arrogance in ignoring local farmers and communities and failing to give them a fair chance of responding to a 4000-page document on Vickery coal mine,” Mr Buckingham said.

“Minister Roberts has failed to acknowledge that many local folks are flat out keeping their livestock and farms alive in drought conditions.

“Local farmers and community members have asked for an reasonable extension of time to read thousands of pages of documents and make a considered response, but the Minister won’t listen.

“What does the NSW Government have to hide on this Vickery coal mine proposal?”...

Adani Group has Morrison, Price, Littleproud & Taylor wrapped around its little finger

Since September 2013 the Australian Liberal-Nationals Coalition Government has been a rolling national disaster.

This latest episode appears to have its roots in the hard right's commitment to dismantle environmental protections.

Especially replacing Labor's "water trigger" amendment to the ENVIRONMENT PROTECTION AND BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION ACT 1999 with a band-aid which fooled no-one.

ABC News, 25 September 2018:

A farmer has been denied access to a river system Adani plans on drawing 12.5 billion litres of water from in what activists are calling a "double standard", documents obtained under freedom of information laws show.

The mining giant plans to take 12.5 billion litres of water from the Suttor River every year, nearly as much as all local farmers combined.

Despite this amount, the documents show at least one irrigator had their application for a water licence rejected in 2011, leading activists to claim farmers were assessed more harshly than Adani.

The documents also show the modelling used by the company to predict the impacts of the water usage ignored the past 14 years of rainfall data and, despite planning to take water until 2077, it did not take into account the impacts of climate change.

The revelations came a week after the Federal Government decided to assess the environmental impacts of Adani's water take without a full environmental impact statement.

"Altogether, this underscores how poor the decision was last week to allow 12.5 billion litres to be taken without assessment," Carmel Flint from anti-mining group Lock The Gate Alliance said. The group obtained the documents under Queensland's Right To Information laws.....

Anthropomorphic Global Warming in Australia 2018

Australians have been told repeatedly that global warming leading to climate change is real.

The continent is becomng dryer, record air and ground temperatures are no longer novel, heavy rain events are predicted to become more destructive, mass flora and fauna extinctions are expected and the coastline is beginning to erode faster than at the historical rate.

It's not just happenng in Australia, other continents are also experience climate change and, the one factor most have in common is generations of ever increasing greenhouse gas emissions produced by both households and industries in metropolitan, regional and rural areas.

Everyone bears some responsibility for where the world finds itself......

NDEVR Environmental:

In the first quarter of 2018 Australia’s total greenhouse gas emissions will be over MT 7.3 CO₂-e  higher than the national Paris ERT commitment made on our behalf by the Australian Government.

Over one quarter of Australia’s CO₂-e budget for 2013 to 2050 has already been spent in the last 4.75 years.

AUSTRALIA’S ANNUAL EMISSIONS, CALENDAR YEAR TO SEPTEMBER 2017*

* This graph includes both published Government NGGI data and Ndevr Environmental projections for Q4/FY2017 and Q1/FY2018

BY  SECTOR 2005-2017

~~~~~~~~~~~

World-wide, land used for non-animal and animal-based agriculture in 2017 was estimated to produce 24% of all global greenhouse gas emissions.

In Australia agriculture was responsible for est. 85.03 CO2-eMt or about 16% of Australia’s total greenhouse gas emissions in 2013:

66.3% from enteric fermentation in ruminant livestock (eructation and flatulence)

15.5% from agricultural soils

10.8% from prescribed burning of savannas

3.9% from manure management

2.4% from liming and urea application

and the remainder from rice cultivation and field burning of agricultural residues.

Total greenhouse gas emissions from world-wide food systems in 2012 contributed between 19% to 29% of all global greenhouse gas emissions. By 2030 the combined greenhouse gas emissions from global food production is expected to double.

~~~~~~~~~~~

National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting, Australia’s highest 10 greenhouse gas emitters 2016–17