Australia
May 23, 2013
Peak horticulture organisation Growcom said that the Queensland land audit released this week showed horticulture’s enormous potential in the State.
Chief Advocate Rachel Mackenzie said that horticulture, which is currently the state’s second largest agricultural industry, worth about $1.9 billion, used less than 0.1 per cent of the land area.
“About 7.5 per cent of the state’s land area is classified as suitable for perennial horticulture, such as tree crops, and about 12.7 per cent is suitable for annual horticulture, such as vegetables,” Ms Mackenzie said.
“Clearly, investment in Queensland’s horticultural industry could be the easiest, most efficient and less environmentally damaging way to boost food production in line with the Queensland government’s goal to double the value of production by 2040.
“However, the audit also identifies a number of constraints that limit that potential, including access to water and other resources, labour, and market saturation.
“We would add that the greatest current constraint on the sector’s potential is farm profitability. Currently, the industry is battling to recover after the latest extreme weather event (ex-Tropical Cyclone Oswald), dramatically escalating costs of electricity and water, the high Australian dollar, the effect of the supermarket duopoly on returns and a raft of regulatory obligations.
“The challenge for the industry and the Queensland Government is to overcome these constraints by supporting infrastructure development such as access to affordable irrigation water and electricity, building an all weather Bruce Highway, reducing or streamlining regulation that hobbles the industry, containing costs and developing export markets to overcome domestic market saturation.
“We congratulate the Queensland Government on the enormous amount of work that has gone into the Land Audit. This is an important initiative that will enable more efficient planning to support sustainable rural industries and communities over the coming decades, and has provided a clear map for future development of the horticultural industry.”
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