As bad as it gets

Extract from article published in the Sunday Mail by Paul Ashenden

October 13, 2024

Photos: Ben Clark

Broadacre farmers are hurting in all corners of the state. Graziers have forked out hundreds of thousands of dollars in feed and many grain producers won’t even wheel their header out of the shed to harvest.

Grain Producers SA says the state is in drought and most farmers say it’s the worst anyone can remember.

The epicentre of the drought is in the Mid North, where rainfall is at a record low. Barley, beans, wheat, canola and lentil crops are a pathetic shell of what they should be at this time of year.

Some farmers will lose $500,000 because they won’t have a harvest. Some will lose $1m. Some will lose more.

Gladstone’s silo and storage sheds, touted as the largest inland storage facility in Australia, traditionally receives between 400,000 and 450,000 tonnes of grain each harvest.

This year, farmers wouldn’t be surprised if less than 10,000 tonnes are delivered.

Mid North farmers are in the process of establishing a grain register so that those fortunate enough to harvest some crop and store the grain will be able to offer any they don’t need next year to their neighbours.

Andrew Zanker, 50, farms about 800ha just around the corner from the Richies. The fifth-generation farmer says Appila was suffering drought conditions last year but this year is “as bad as it gets”.

He has written off 11 of the 15 paddocks he sowed earlier this year and is hopeful, rather than confident, of harvesting anything from the remaining four.

“I don’t think there’s anyone living that’s seen it so dry,” Mr Zanker says. “We haven’t seen it like this before, so we’re in uncharted waters at the moment.

There are people in very good areas that will barely reap anything. It’s affecting everyone.

“This year is a total hit for me – 100 per cent. It’s basically start again. We’ve just got to load up, cross this year off and go again next year.”

Mr Zanker is secretary of Laura Ag Bureau which helped organise a social night earlier this month that attracted 100 farmers who jumped at the opportunity to get together, share stories and look for financial and emotional pathways through this disaster.

HUGE FLOW-ON EFFECT

Andrew Kitto, 63, who farms 850ha near Gladstone, is also a member of the Laura Ag Bureau. Like everyone else in the region, his finances will go backwards this year and he says one of the keys to surviving will be meetings such as that one earlier this month.

“It gave people hope that they are not alone, and that was the main thing,” he says as he swipes away a fly.

“There were people there that are good farmers that we’ve never seen at meetings before. And they’ve come along, because a lot of farmers are hurting … and it was all about just standing there talking, shoulder to shoulder, about stuff … you’re not alone.”

Mr Kitto is also a contract harvester, but his customer numbers have dropped from 30 in 2022 to 20 last year to just five this year, a change he describes as “a huge reduction in income”.

“I think I was probably at the lowest about early August and thinking things aren’t looking too good,” he says when asked about the mental toll of the drought.

“And then it started to filter into town people in the middle of September, when they’re driving around, they didn’t realise how bad it was.

“And things in rural businesses have just dried up – in towns generally, and people have just stopped spending, so it’s affecting not only the farmers but all businesses – machinery and things like that.

“It’s going to be a real big, big blow for them. And it’s just the flow-on effect. We’re trying to get the message out to the government and people in power that things are going to be very crook in the whole of South Australia. Not just this year, but next year as well.”