Chris Delforce’s extremist Aussie Farms website, activist map exposed

The Aussie Farms website is a dangerous sham — and Chris Delforce listing one of Victoria’s largest vegetable farms is even more evidence of that, writes Ed Gannon.

Chris Delforce. Picture: Lawrence Pinder

EVER wondered how you get black-eyed peas? What about cauliflower ears?

It’s because those unfortunate vegies were raised on a cruel vegetable farm.

Surely I jest. Well, if the Aussie Farms map of Australian farms is anything to go by, then I’m not.

Because the website, which claims to be a repository of farms and businesses that are cruel to animals, has actually listed one of Victoria’s largest vegetable farms.

The farm has no livestock, but the owner says it has plenty of “free-range lettuces”.

It is the latest development to expose the extremist website and its activist attack map as a sham.

A dangerous sham, nonetheless.

An investigation by The Weekly Times’ Shannon Twomey and Chantelle Francis has revealed the map as little more than a pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey exercise.

After being quizzed as to why a vegetable farm is on a so-called animal cruelty map, creator Chris Delforce admitted he didn’t know what many of the farms listed on the map were actually used for.

Consider that Mr Delforce a week prior confidently told The Weekly Times the map contained only farms that were: “commercial businesses known or suspected to be engaged in animal cruelty or exploitation”.

It appears Aussie Farms is confusing cows with carrots and rams with rhubarb.

It has not been a good few weeks for Mr Delforce and his map.

First The Weekly Times revealed his mother, Julie Delforce, was a director and owner of a web-design business with links to the Aussie Farms site as well as being a senior agriculture official with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Not a good look in a world of tight public-service conflict-of-interest rules.

Then it was revealed that at least one of Mr Delforce’s family — a livestock farmer — wasn’t on the map.

This was despite Mr Delforce claiming for months farms didn’t have a choice about whether they were on the map or not.

It was when confronted with this family omission that he said all those listed were “known or suspected to be engaged in animal cruelty or exploitation”.

That line has exposed him to a potential defamation lawsuit by farmers listed on the map.

Of the 5779 farms and businesses listed on the map, a staggering 1246 are classified as unknown. The vegetable farm was one of those listed as unknown.

Asked how he could accuse a farm of being cruel to animals when he didn’t even know what sort of farm it was, Mr Delforce said:

“Because they are likely to be broiler or other poultry farms, which have a distinct appearance, and obviously involve cruelty, but if it’s not known whether they’re a broiler, egg layer, turkey, duck or quail farm, they won’t be marked as a particular one of those. Similarly, some farms may look like dairies, but if we’re not certain, they won’t be marked as a dairy.”

Mr Delforce is working on the theory that a property on Google Maps that has a large shed is treating animals badly inside that shed.

Vegetable farms have big sheds. So too do grain farms.

It is laughable, but there are serious issues here.

Mr Delforce has created a public guide for extreme activists to break into and damage farms. Farmers listed on the map fear for the safety of their families.

The Federal Government has said it will shut down the Aussie Farms site. Yet it is still there, 10 months after going public.

And Aussie Farms is a registered charity on the Australian Charities and Not-for-Profits Commission.

MORE: ACTIVIST CHRIS DELFORCE’S MOTHER IS LEADING AG OFFICIAL

AG OFFICIAL JULIE DELFORCE’S LINK TO AUSSIE FARMS WEBSITE

‘HYPOCRITICAL’ CHRIS DELFORCE LEAVES HIS FAMILY OFF FARM MAP

How on earth can an organisation that incites illegal activity be a charity?

The listing of a vegetable farm on the Aussie Farms map may be a joke.

But the existence of such a map is no laughing matter.

• Ed Gannon is Editor of The Weekly Times

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