简体中文
Australia must introduce game-changing strategies to become Asia's food bowl and reach its potential in feeding the 9 billion people predicted to be living on Earth by 2050, said some Australian agribusiness experts.
According to Daniel Kruithoff, managing director of seed developer Monsanto Australia and New Zealand, a decline in productivity stands in Australia's way to takeup the challenge.
"Australian farming really is at a pivotal point, and the question is, can Australia actually capitalize on this boom in demand for our products -- to a potential that it can actually show up more on farmers' bottom lines,"Kruithoff told delegates at a Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) Agribusiness Outlook forum in Sydney on Thursday.
"We need to make some big plays to not only arrest our declining productivity growth but to fend off rising competition from other food producing countries.
"The importance of getting this right quickly is essential. Time's not on our side with this rapidly unfolding Asian century, so we need to invest wisely but also quickly," he added.
New South Wales(NSW) Deputy Premier Andrew Stoner assured the CEDA audience that increasing productivity and innovation for the agricultural sector are at the top of the state's priority list.
"The current food production model needs to develop and adapt to be able to address tomorrow's challenges," said Stoner.
"One thing that's for certain is that our food and fiber exporters will need to do more with less.
"The NSW government is backing our farmers in every possible way to boost production sustainably and efficiently.
"We will continue to work hard with our farming community and capitalize on the opportunities presented by increasing local demand for food production," he said.
Kruithoff said that the slowdown in agricultural productivity could not just be blamed on drought and tough climatic conditions in Australia, or on competition with the mining sector for funding and resources, but is linked to reduced public spending on research in the past.
"There is a very long time lag between the impact of those investments and the output. R and D does take time.
"If today we wanted to produce a new product into a market, say an onion that was easy to peel, wasn't pungent, didn't make you cry when you cut it, sweeter so people wanted to consume more -- if you wanted to embark on that it would be about 15 years before you actually saw this new variety in the hands of farmers and being produced," he said.
He added that Australia would have to lift its game to trump rising competitors overseas -- and this could involve looking at pre-existing research from overseas.
"We see that countries in developing parts of the world, in Asia in particular, the urbanization middle class is growing but at the same time their agricultural sectors are also becoming more sophisticated and are also producing more.
"Australia only invests about 2 percent of the agricultural research completed around the world, so we're only a relatively small player in this area. Therefore, tapping into global R and D and adapting it to Australian conditions can be a very cost- effective way to innovate," he said.
The NSW government is currently developing an Agriculture Industry Action Plan, which will address the issue of productivity and set out a vision for the industry over the next 10 years, said Stoner.
"NSW's agribusiness sector is in the front seat of the global food boom, and we're well positioned to capitalize on opportunities. I believe that our farmers in NSW, and more broadly speaking Australia, are extremely well-place to tackle tomorrow's challenges.
"The NSW government is behind our agricultural sector all the way," he added.
In the past, China's changing appetites have had far-reaching effects on global trade, said Luke Matthews, agricultural commodity strategist at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, but this demand is not expected to rise indefinitely.
"It's very commodity-specific," Matthews told the CEDA audience, describing four phases of consumption, with a rising demand in white meat from 1980 to 2010, dairy in 2005, and currently a shift to red meat and emerging markets in sugar, wine and beer.
"What the Chinese did was pick up their per capita meat consumption at a much lower income level than we observed elsewhere.
"One thing that's becoming evident is that that growth is plateauing. Chinese per capita meat consumption is now leveling off at levels that are consistent with other developed Asian nations. So the incremental growth in the meat story out of China, which has driven feed grain markets more broadly, is perhaps showing signs of wane," he said.
On one thing the agribusiness outlook speakers agreed: there are changing times ahead for Australian farmers.
"Farming isn't farming anymore. A farmer these days should be referred to as a rural entrepreneur," said Thos Gieskes, managing director of Rabobank Australia and New Zealand Group.
Modern farmers are now managing finance risks and hedging, global markets, risk management tools, high-tech innovation, and managing and retaining labor, he said.
"We know that our farm community is very innovative. They've survived all sorts of challenges," said Stoner.
"We believe the future is bright," he added.
