Federal election: Attracting young people to farming must be priority

ATTRACTING young people to farming must be an election priority says Warrion farmer Sarah Chant.

Fair call: Dairy farmer Sarah Chant on her farm at Warrion. Picture: Andy Rogers

ATTRACTING and retaining young people on the land should be a priority for whoever leads the nation, Sarah Chant says.

The 27-year-old dairy farmer says a combination of high electricity prices, penalty rates and the supermarket price squeeze meant the primary producer was getting limited reward for maximum effort.

“If I had an opportunity to speak to the PM or the Opposition Leader, I’d say farmers, particularly young farmers, aren’t getting a fair go,” Ms Chant said.

“The low prices that the supermarkets charge for milk can’t go on forever. Even though it’s no longer a dollar a litre, it’s still very low. Whoever’s in government has to make sure that the supermarkets aren’t squeezing farmers out of the industry.”

The Warrion farmer has operated a 250-head property in the Colac region for the past year independently, but has worked on the family farm since she was young.

She said balancing the books was particularly hard due to prohibitively high electricity prices.

“You do have to shop around for the lowest electricity prices, it can be pretty difficult,” Ms Chant said.

“Farmers pay a lot more for power than homes in the city. Some assistance from government would help. I also have concerns about Labor’s penalty rates changes. If there’s a rise in penalty rates, then many farmers won’t be able to employ anyone. They’ll just take on more of the work themselves because they can’t afford the extra cost.”

Ms Chant said several generations of young Australians — those of school age and many city people in their 20s — did not have a basic understanding of agriculture.

“We really need to take on the animal rights movement in the schools — give kids the facts from an early age,” she said.

“Farmers care for their animals. But the big problem in the city is people don’t know where their food comes from or get the wrong idea about how farms go about their business. If we had classes focused on farming, it would clear up that misinformation.”