NSW Farmers calling for $53m to support live sheep export transition

The state’s peak farming body is calling for the federal government to provide at least $53m in additional assistance amid the live sheep export phase out decision.

NSW Farmers is calling for at least $53m in additional assistance from the federal government to ”ensure the long-term viability” of the state’s sheep industry, in the wake of the live sheep export phase out decision.

NSW Farmers president Xavier Martin.

Fronting the NSW Upper House inquiry into the impact of the ban on Wednesday, NSW Farmers president Xavier Martin said it was still unknown what specific support would be available to non-West Australian sheep producers, as part of the government’s $139.7m transition package.

“What will be provided to adequately support sheep farmers in NSW? It must be additional funding to support what has been announced, given the insufficient funding being made available for farmers in the west,” Mr Martin said.

In its submission to the inquiry, NSW Farmers said its own analysis had shown the state’s sheep producers could face a short-term $125.2m hit as a result of a supply glut of sheep from Western Australia, equal to 18-32 per cent of the cost to WA farmers.

The association said as a result of short and long-term impacts, a minimum of $53m was necessary to support the industry, and that any additional funding ‘should be targeted towards drought resilience and recovery funding within sheep regions of NSW’.

The NSW Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development hit back at the economic modelling, saying the perceived impacts of the ban on NSW were so small, that DPIRD did not believe a submission to the inquiry was warranted.

DPIRD group director of livestock systems Dougal Gordon outlined six reasons why the impact was expected to be “small and short term in nature”, including the high cost of transporting sheep from WA to NSW, a decline in the WA sheep flock, and the capacity for WA meat processing to increase.

Alliance for Animals policy director Jed Goodfellow told the inquiry that while he hadn’t asked for an analysis of the $53m being proposed, he said it struck him “as probably being a bit excessive.”

“We support government assistance in relation to dealing with drought and increasing resilience. But to tie that to the phase-out of live sheep exports in WA is a very long bow to draw in the absence of quite strong, tangible evidence showing a causal relationship between the phase-out of live sheep exports in WA and impacts on the New South Wales industry,” he said.