NSW Farmers conference tackles the big issues in agriculture

Farmers call for more renewable energy planning control

At the annual NSW Farmers Association conference in Sydney, farmers fired up over renewable energy and demanded more control over how projects are planned.

Delegates also called for payments to farmers hosting renewable energy projects to be paid for the life of the project and not the 25-year term currently being offered.

"Delegates are expressing their frustration ... most are saying in living memory they can't remember anything so badly thought through," freshly re-elected President of NSW Farmers Xavier Martin said.

"The impact on the landscape on some of our prime agricultural land is just appalling."

While NSW Environment Minister Penny Sharpe acknowledged there had been problems with the rollout of renewable energy, she said things were turning around.

"I know many of you struggle with the renewable energy zones ... the rollout is complicated, but the rollout is well under way," the minister told delegates on Wednesday.

"I'm not going to tell you that it's perfect, but it is turning it around.

"I would hope that we are learning all the time from the mistakes of the past and we're getting better on the way through," she said of projects that had divided some communities.

The minister again ruled out sending transmission lines underground.

"It is too expensive and it will take too long, our government's been really up front about that," she told reporters.

Address delivered by NSW Premier

NSW Premier Chris Minns also addressed the conference on Wednesday acknowledging the threat posed by fire ants and feral pigs.

The Premier outlined efforts that had controlled 110,000 pigs in a nine-month period, but conceded there were still feral pig “hotspots” across the state.

The power of the supermarkets was again discussed by farmers who called for greater fairness and expanded competition in the food and retail supply chain.

READ MORE: Woolworths employee ejected from NSW Farmers conference

Leadership

NSW Farmers President Xavier Martin and Vice President Rebecca Reardon were re-elected to their positions, unopposed, for a second term at the Conference.

In addition, Ian McColl, Justin Everitt and Bronwyn Petrie were elected to the NSW Farmers Board.

Farmers reject ban on new renewable plans

On Tuesday, the assembled farmers rejected plans for their representative body to oppose new solar and wind projects or call for a bounty on feral pigs.

A motion for a moratorium on industrial scale wind and solar developments in NSW did not pass and instead was sent to one of the association's committees to be reviewed.

Those in favour of the moratorium said there was a lack of transparency and safety concerns around projects, arguing they were only calling for a temporary halt.

There had been little transparency and consultation on the environmental impacts of large-scale renewable developments, Guyra farmer James Jackson said.

"This is a rolling mess and a moratorium from this organisation ... will give our key spokespeople a really good opportunity to talk on the angst in the community," he said.

Others argued the motion was based on ideology and renewable projects were critical for the nation's future power supply.

NSW had the slowest project planning approvals in Australia, while experts said the state would need more than double its current electricity supply by 2025, Walcha farmer Warwick Fletcher said.

"The crux of the matter is we need electricity ... the more you have, the cheaper it is," he said.

Pig bounty fails to get support

A motion to implement a $20-per-head feral pig bounty also failed on Tuesday.

Feral pigs often travel many kilometres to get to farmlands which they then destroy.

NSW Farmers will instead call for more resources and funding from the state government for research into biological pig controls and support for landowners.

Current controls, including poisoning, trapping and shooting, have not changed since the 1960s and farmers were now looking for novel ways to reduce pig numbers, the conference heard.

Coolah farmer Tom Dunlop has been a livestock and crop farmer for more than 27 years but his business has suffered as feral pig numbers explode and hoards of the pests invade his farmlands, bringing destruction and diseases.

"They will come from surrounding hills and they'll travel basically 27km or more to get to a sorghum crop, and they just love it," he said.

Mr Dunlop experienced his worst sorghum crop loss in 2022 when an estimated 350 tonnes was destroyed by feral pigs, costing him more than $80,000 in damage on top of further destruction of his grain crop.

"During the drought, we weren't seeing pigs but since we've had those three wet years, they've just exploded (in numbers) and bred quickly out of control," he said.

Mr Dunlop traps and shoots an average 50 pigs per week, while his neighbours send up helicopters monthly at a cost of $1600 an hour, but their attempts have been ineffective in controlling numbers.

Traceability in focus

National traceability reforms were also on the agenda on Tuesday, with farmers warning their support for the reforms remained contingent on several key principles being met.

“Delegates were very clear today that governments needed to step up – and big time – to ensure farmers could successfully transition through these traceability reforms, without huge costs or regulatory burdens being placed on them,” Mr Martin said.

“Insufficient funding to support producers through these reforms, as well as the lack of tag-free pathways for animals moving directly from their property of birth to slaughter, were among the issues farmers must have addressed and fast to transition to this new system by 2025.