QLD: Grain growers face lean Christmas after harvest hit

AAP General News (Australia)
12-22-1998
QLD: Grain growers face lean Christmas after harvest hit

BRISBANE, Dec 22 AAP - Many Queensland graingrowers faced a lean Christmas and continued
uncertainty because of delays in a federal response to a disastrous wheat harvest, the
Queensland Graingrowers Association (QGGA) said today.

The QGGA has been pressing for federal exceptional circumstances assistance after the
unseasonably wet winter wiped up to $350 million off the value of the state's wheat crop, QGGA
president Brendan Stewart said.

"This translates as a $1.2 billion to $1.4 billion loss to the Queensland economy, due to
the flow-on effect from primary production," he said in a statement.

"We've been inviting Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry Minister Mark Vaile for several
months now to tour the worst hit grain regions.

"With Christmas almost upon us, we're still waiting. I'm concerned that the longer the
Minister leaves his visit, the more likely growers are to feel forgotten."

The wet winter causes disease and sprouting problems, leading to massive drops in income as
crops are downgraded, according to Mr Stewart.

"For many growers, who invested heavily to produce the crop in the first place, costs will
outweigh income," he said.

"And for central Queensland growers, it's a double whammy, coming on the back of years of
drought."

The QGGA has supported a submission from the Queensland Department of Primary Industries to
the federal government requesting exceptional circumstances assistance.

"We now expect the minister to urgently dispatch a rural adjustment advisory committee team
to examine the extreme losses, which should trigger the assistance so desperately needed," Mr
Stewart said.

AAP jhm

KEYWORD: GRAIN

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