‘If we get another event upstream, we could end up with a big disaster’

Banana and sugarcane growers are counting the cost of the Queensland floods. See the latest.

Banana and sugarcane growers are calling for funding to help with replanting, after their crops were inundated by the past week’s tropical flooding rains.

Severe thunderstorms have flooded Queensland regions, with the highest seven-day totals at Macknade near Ingham (1568mm), Cardwell Range (1416mm), Halifax (1391mm) and Bambaroo (1262mm).

Canegrowers Burdekin director and Home Hill farmer Owen Menkins said they recorded 500mm of rain in the past week, which had since steadied.

“It did pretty expensive damage to the cane (in the Herbert region), I think they’re waiting for the water to drop down before they see the damage,” he said.

Mr Menkins said they called on the government to announce a Category C event, which meant farmers would be able to receive recovery grants and funds for replanting. The classification is for exceptional circumstances assistance in severely-affected communities after disaster events.

“We had a lot of water, the rain was sporadic enough for it to run away, but the Burdekin River is a massive river running through us and it’s at moderate flood level at the moment, it’s right up to the banks,” he said.

“If we get another event upstream, we could end up with a big disaster here. It’s holding just below major flood levels, it creates all sorts of dramas.”

Mr Menkins said the current rain event was reminiscent of 2012, when the Burdekin River reached a similar level.

He said the length of the wet weather meant sugarcane growth had been affected, with no sun for nearly two weeks.

“There’s been water lying in the cane, it’ll affect here locally and in the badly-hit areas it will have a major effect on the harvest for the 2025 season,” he said.

He believed one third of Queensland’s sugar cane region had been affected, and last year’s Cyclone Kirrily caused a one million tonne cane production loss.

Flood water covers the Bruce Highway at Euramo, south of the Tully River, the furthest south the Far North Queensland residents can currently travel by road. Picture: Brendan Radke

Australian Banana Growers Council chair Leon Collins has properties at both Tully and Lakeland – where he farms bananas, sugarcane, beef and avocados – and recorded 126mm in one hour.

“We had a wall of water come down the Tully River. We haven’t seen water come down the Tully like that since 1986,” he said.

“Banana plants love water, they’re full of water. But they don’t like wet feet, once you go over 48 hours you start to get damage and plants will start to shut down.”

Mr Collins said they were still assessing the situation, and had processed fruit with water inundation.

He said any funding would help.

“We’d just finished getting our infrastructure just right, before Christmas. Now the same infrastructure is buggered, it’s just gone,” he said.

Mr Collins said the domestic market had just had its back-to-school special, and would need retail prices to rise to assist growers’ recovery.

“We’ll have reduced production, no doubt about that, we’ll need to chop a lot down because it’s covered in silt,” he said.

“It’ll take a good 11 weeks before we have clean fruit.”

He said their current major problem was transport, due to coastal and inland floods.

“There are trucks full of fruit stuck on each side of creeks, it’s a bit of a disaster,” Mr Collins said.

He said he hoped the state government would consider a dual carriage weight road between Cairns and Brisbane.

Several towns between Cairns and Townsville, along the coast, recorded more than 100mm of rain in the 24 hours to Wednesday 9am. High rain totals included Cairns (180mm), Clyde Rd Alert weather station near Innisfail (212mm), South Mission Beach weather station (287mm), and Bingil Bay (179mm).

The Bureau of Meteorology has issued a major flood warning for the Herbert River, while Burdekin, Connors, Isaac, Murray and Ross rivers were under moderate flood warnings.

The Tully, Bohle, Don, Haughton and Mulgrave rivers had minor flood warnings.

Originally published as ‘If we get another event upstream, we could end up with a big disaster’