Guy Barnett,Minister for Primary Industries and Water
Confidence amongst Tasmanian farmers continues to lead the nation as the Tasmanian Liberal Government invests and supports this vital sector of our economy.
For the third quarter in a row, the Rabobank Rural Confidence Survey shows Tasmanian farmers are amongst the most confident and optimistic in the country.
The latest Rabobank survey shows that 90 per cent of Tasmanian farmers surveyed expect, ”business conditions to remain as they are, or improve further, over the year ahead.”
According to Rabobank Area Manager for Tasmania Stuart Whiting: ”Tasmanian farmers are absolutely very positive about the current conditions, especially due to commodity and land prices. It’s been a phenomenal ride.”
The sentiment was strongest among the State’s beef producers with just under 75 per cent expecting business conditions to improve even further.
The majority of dairy farmers also expect the current good conditions to continue. In 2020-21, Tasmanian dairy industry hit a record production of 961 million litres of milk, which was up 1.2 per cent from the previous year.
This positive outlook for Tasmanian farmers comes on the back of the latest ABS data for 2020-21 which shows that the Gross Value Added by Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing rose by 21.1 per cent and accounted for around half of the growth in Gross State Product of 3.8 per cent for that year.
The gross farm gate value of agricultural production in Tasmania has also exceeded $2 billion for the first time, growing by 13 per cent to $2.15 billion as shown in Tasmania’s 2019-2020 Agri-Food Scorecard.
The Tasmanian Government is backing our farmers and we are firmly on track towards our goal to sustainably grow the farm gate value of Tasmanian agriculture to $10 billion by 2050.
