Nearly three-quarters of Australian farmers believe the Albanese government’s policies are hurting the industry, according to a new survey by the agriculture sector’s peak industry body.
The National Farmers Federation’s annual priorities survey of 1026 Australian farmers has revealed a massive swing against the first-term government in the past year, with sentiment against Labor rising by 30-plus per cent.
Federal climate change policies, biosecurity, supermarket power, transport infrastructure and the phase-out of live sheep exports topped the list of concerns.
Asked if the Albanese government’s policies were harming the industry, 49.8 per cent “strongly agreed”, 23.5 per cent “agreed”, 11.9 per cent were neutral, 5.4 per cent “disagreed” and 9.4 per cent “strongly disagreed”.
Asked whether the government had a positive plan to grow the farm sector, some 80.1 per cent disagreed.
NFF president David Jochinke said the results of the survey, conducted by advisory firm Seftons, were unsurprising. “Critical issues like the live sheep export ban, biosecurity tax and water buybacks have weighed heavily on farmers,” he said. “Particularly telling are the results around live sheep exports. Despite only 10 per cent of respondents hailing from WA, it rated as one of the highest areas of concern.
“This clearly demonstrates when bad policy infiltrates one sector, it puts every other sector on notice that they could be next.”
Government regulation was also a significant bugbear of those surveyed, with 87 per cent of respondents agreeing the burden of red tape was increasing. Of particular concern were environmental laws and land use restrictions.
Mr Jochinke said farmers felt they were being “steamrolled by harmful policies” that were “driven by activist groups or politicians” but were willing to work with the government to turn the negative sentiment around.
On a positive note, the number of farmers saying they loved their job increased by 18 per cent in the past year, with 88.7 per cent backing the sentiment; 776 per cent said their community was a great place to live.
Many farmers said their thoughts about the future of the agriculture industry had declined over the past year, with only about a quarter of farmers believing their work was valued by the Australian public.
Nearly all respondents said increasing costs were negatively affecting productivity of their operations.
The survey comes a year after the NFF declared war against Labor, saying Anthony Albanese was pursuing “a niche ideological agenda” ahead of farmer interests.
Farmers in WA, where the country’s live sheep export industry is based, have amassed a war chest to fund an anti-Labor campaign in marginal electorates in the state in a bid to unseat the party’s candidates at the next federal election.
The sheep and wool industry plans to hold a national rally outside Parliament House in Canberra on September 10 to protest against the Albanese government’s plan to shut down the live sheep export trade by mid 2028.
“Albo has seriously underestimated Australian agriculture. So far, he’s listened to activists and noisy minorities but ignored farmers, truckies and regional communities,” Keep the Sheep campaign spokesman Ben Sutherland said.
“We’ve seen the government push through the ban on live sheep exports, but we also have a mounting pile of evidence that they don’t care about issues across the board outside major capital cities.”
The release of the NFF survey comes ahead of the return of the annual Bush Summit, which begins in Queensland on Friday.
