5 Sept 2018
The persistent drought conditions across Queensland are challenging many farmers from various agricultural industries. The visual impacts of drought – dry dams, no grass, hungry stock – has led to an increased awareness of life on the land and reminded consumers how important farming is to our society. While consumers have responded with more conscious decisions to buy local produce and if necessary, pay a little more for it, supermarkets have been reluctant to reflect the increased cost of producing quality food at the checkout.
For Queensland’s dairy, chicken meat, pork and egg farmers this is having a crippling effect. These farmers are effectively hidden casualties of the current drought. Operating high throughput businesses that require a constant, high quality feed supply, they currently do not receive any assistance from the state government to deal with the escalating cost of feed and have been unsuccessful in getting the major supermarkets to increase the retail price of their produce.
Spiralling feed costs have increased the cost of production for dairy farmers by at least 15c/L of milk, but supermarkets continue to sell it for $1/L. Feed costs account for about 70 per cent of the total cost of growing a meat chicken, yet you can still buy RSPCA-approved fresh deli chicken breasts for $8.50/kg. Pork producers are currently losing $30 on every pig sold, and it is costing egg farmers an extra 30 per cent to produce a dozen eggs, but prices remain stagnant and if anything are falling.
While supermarkets refuse to increase prices, they are very happy to drop them. After a spike in winter temperatures brought strawberry fields to peak production late last week, major retailers slashed prices to as low as $1.00 per punnet to help suppliers move excess stock.
With our major supermarkets controlling about 85 per cent of the market share, it is hard not to draw the conclusion that there is more than just supply and demand economics going on.
The post Fair price for farmers appeared first on Queensland Farmers' Federation.