Right to repair agricultural equipment a step closer for farmers

Farmers are hopeful they will soon be able to fix their own agricultural equipment, with the federal government open to introducing mandatory right to repair laws.

Farmers have been given hope of soon being able to fix their own agricultural equipment, with the federal government open to introducing mandatory right to repair laws.

Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury Andrew Leigh told The Weekly Times that he would welcome consultation on expanding the motor vehicle service and repair information sharing scheme to agricultural machinery.

The scheme began in July 2022 and requires car manufacturers to make service and repair information available to local independent repairers, allowing car owners to choose their own mechanics.

“The previous government did not include agricultural machinery in the motor vehicle repair information sharing scheme,” Dr Leigh said.

Tractor works the fields. Picture: Supplied

“And while we’re still in the first year of the scheme’s operation, we welcome engagement from industry and interested stakeholders who’d like to see the scheme expanded in the future.

“While it’s good to see voluntary information sharing expanding in other countries, the experience in Australia of voluntary data sharing arrangements was that they didn’t deliver for consumers and small business.”

He made those comments after a landmark agreement between the American Farm Bureau Federation and John Deere’s US division in January to allow American farmers to fix John Deere machinery independent of an authorised dealer.

GrainGrowers chief executive Shona Gawel said it was extremely important for the agricultural industry to have the right to repair legislated.

“Government are now putting a positive message out there. So we will be exchanging with them to underscore exactly why it is essential for our agriculture vehicles to be in consideration,” she said.

In 2021, the Productivity Commission recommended the then-Morrison government introduce a repair supplies obligation for agricultural machinery by the end of 2022.

Victorian Farmers Federation grains council president Craig Henderson welcomed the government opening the door to including agricultural machinery in the scheme.

“Our businesses are often in remote locations and miles from (authorised) repairers and it can be days or weeks sometimes to get things repaired,” he said.

“We cannot afford significant downtimes, particularly during harvests, and there are huge knock-on impacts across the business when there is.

“Farms are also generally getting bigger and many producers are wanting to hire on-farm mechanics.”

Australian Automotive Aftermarket Association chief executive Stuart Charity said that, in the same way the automotive right to repair law had transformed the automotive industry, “an agricultural right to repair law would be a game-changer for farmers”.

“The legislation is written in a way that you can alter the scheme rules to include agriculture machinery quite easily. I don’t see any impediments now and we believe agriculture will be the next cab off the rank,” he said.

Mr Charity said while there continued to be some teething issues around technical, codesharing and access to diagnostic tools “we are working through those and eight months in we are starting to really see the benefits of our scheme”.