NSW Farmers President Xavier Martin says farmers will do everything in their power to protect the state’s food bowl from new mines and coal seam gas exploration following anti- farming rhetoric from a multinational miner.
It follows comments from Woodside CEO Meg O’Neill who labelled farmers as activists with ‘deep pockets’ during her National Press Club address this week.
NSW Farmers President Xavier Martin said that claim was “ridiculous”, and that the big energy companies need to be reined back in with new mines and coal seam gas exploration approved for the state’s food bowls.
“The McPhillamy’s Gold Mine at Blayney will include an open-cut pit and tailings storage at the source of the Belubula River, along with a 90-kilometere pipeline to send ‘excess’ water to a coal mine near Lithgow”, Mr Martin said.
“Another disruptive mine that would produce silver, zinc and lead was approved for Lue, about 30 kilometres outside Mudgee, while the NSW Resources Regulator approved the reactivation of legacy coal seam gas wells near Gunnedah during the caretaker period before the state election.”
Mr Martin said these approvals, along with anti-farmer spin from a major mining and energy company this week, were solid proof that a strong Independent Agriculture Commissioner was urgently needed.
“Woodside made a $5 billion profit last year and helped release more than 60 million tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere, and they want free rein to do more,” Mr Martin said.
“They talk about ‘decarbonisation commitments’ and ‘keeping the lights on in Asian megacities’, but the truth is this is all about money for them, and farmers and rural communities are in the firing line.”
Mr Martin said farmers were deeply concerned about new mines and CSG operations that would not only disrupt food and fibre production, but also endanger town and farm water security when the next drought arrived.
“We are losing productive agricultural land to industrialisation, and this is one of the reasons we have long called for a truly independent agriculture commissioner who can make our planning laws fit for purpose,” Mr Martin said.
“As long as we’ve got the big end of town throwing around money and spin while manipulating the process as they try to dig up the state’s best farmland, we will continue to speak out.
“If the Woodside CEO really wants to see farmer activism in practice, perhaps a tractor blockade of their head office is in order!”
One of NSW Labor’s key election promises was to deliver a truly independent Agriculture Commissioner if elected, and Mr Martin said it was vital this role had the power and responsibility to call out the risk to food and fibre production from these sorts of projects.
“We’re talking about the state’s great food-producing regions here, and farmers must be able to care for the land and water free of industrial interference, not only to secure food supply, but also Australia’s economic prosperity into the future,” he said.
