ELIZABETH JACKSON: Being agriculture minister in a country that relies heavily on farm exports has never been an easy job, but climate change will make it a whole lot more difficult from now on.A recent report by the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE) paints a grim picture of the future, projecting a decline in agricultural exports of 15 to 79 per cent by 2050 - if the nation fails to adapt to global warming.That's just one of the challenges facing new Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry Minister, Tony Burke.And he has another small hurdle to leap; he represents an inner city Sydney seat.
Minister, good morning.
TONY BURKE: G'day.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: Do you know one end of a cow from another?
TONY BURKE: (Laughs) It's about 80 years since my family left the land and I'm a good deal younger than that. So, I mean, people have been critical of me having a lack of experience in terms of my own life out on the land. They're right. They're right, I don't bring a wealth of personal stories or of personal baggage to the portfolio.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: So how are you equipped to do the job?
TONY BURKE: Well, I think the way you have to do the job, more important than what you've done before you've got the job, is how you do it while you're there and my style, very much has been not simply to deal with the department and the stakeholder official lobby groups but to spend as much time as I can actually out there talking face to face with stakeholders and farmers themselves.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: Minister, back to the report. It is fairly alarming as you have acknowledged, but as you read through it is says the impact of potential changes in climate on agricultural productivity is uncertain and the estimates range from small loss to potential gains - how do you plan for a future that uncertain?
TONY BURKE: This is where the starting point is to do what farmers have themselves always been pretty good at in Australia and that is to look at serious adaptation to changing conditions. Now this is why when the now government, when we went to the last election, we look policies on Australia's farming future about re-gearing a number of these government programs that are there providing on-farm advice for different structural issues to actually re-gear all of that with a climate change focus.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: So what are you going to throw your efforts into - trying to reduce the carbon output or adaptation? Or both?
TONY BURKE: Oh, look it's both. Farmers have already in terms of doing something about output. We have already seen a massive decrease in land clearing and Australia's record on carbon emissions in terms of what the success we've been able to have on carbon emissions, is largely due to what farmers have done with the reduction in land clearing.The other thing that farmers ….
ELIZABETH JACKSON: But that can't go on forever.
TONY BURKE: Oh, that's right and the other thing which we often don't think about is carbon trapped within the soil and changes in ploughing practices have made a very significant impact and this is ongoing and spreading quickly as a practice of farmers now - to change the ploughing practices to stop releasing carbon from the soil and to find new ways of being able to make sure that you can make very active use of the soil without the old ploughing practices that were releasing carbon into the atmosphere. So there is difference practices that they have been involved with there. On top of that though, you have got to make sure that your R&D (Research and Development) and your support that the Government does provide on the ground is very much geared towards adaptation and adjustment programs.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: Currently, agriculture produces 17 per cent of Australia's total greenhouse gas emissions. Apart from what you have already mentioned, how do you cut that?
TONY BURKE: Well, I think what I mentioned is how you cut that.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: That alone or have you got other strategies in mind?
TONY BURKE: Well, I mean overwhelmingly, the whole national figures have largely been driven by the land clearing changes. What can be done with soils is extraordinarily effective but to go beyond that requires an investment in R&D as well and this is where the research and development that is government funded, we've got policies there about regearing that with a climate change focus. We've got $15 million budgeted over four years where you actually shift your research and development into saying this is an absolute priority.The sector can have a very vibrant healthy future but we've got to make sure we've got the research done into how you can reduce total emissions and then on top of that we've got to make sure that the adaptation possibilities are there so that the industry itself can continue to thrive.Because it is not just rising temperatures or loss of water - there is also dangers with a whole series of new pests and diseases that come with dealing - as knock on effects of dealing with higher temperatures so to get that research and development right - provides an essential part of the pathway through and then you need your on-farm strategies of explaining those adjustment programs and adaptation programs for farmers at the grassroots level.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: What about genetically modified crops? Is that part of the solution?
TONY BURKE: I don't think there is any doubt that that will be a piece of the puzzle. We've had the moratorium dropped now in New South Wales and Victoria. There are particular issues in Western Australia and Tasmania where they believe that there is a particular market they are able to access by not going down the GM path and that is something to continue to consult with them.But certainly some of the pathways forward, will be provided through good technology and science in GM.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: Is the future of Australian agriculture to migrate it north, to areas that do have more rainfall?
TONY BURKE: It will be more complicated than that. There will some areas for example, down along South Australia where going north is actually become a problem and there has been some particular concerns there. There will be adaptation all around the place and there just won't be a single pattern. The answers and the strategies are going to differ from farm to farm because it is not just the rainfall issues, as you go north there will also be with the higher temperatures and the more tropical climate, new problems there with animal and plant diseases so it is not going to be simple. We need to make sure the information is there and we need to have the refocusing of the government programs.But I've got to say, I still have a high level of optimism. Anybody who has a history of farming on a continent like ours is used to being resilient and used to having to adapt and that's the pathway and the challenge and it is the right sort of people who have been dealing with that over the years who are now going to be in the front line of making sure that Australia is ready for both taking on responsibility for reducing the impact of climate change but also ready for, to the extent that climate change itself is inevitable and happening - making sure that we are adapting for a vibrant industry into the future.ELIZABETH JACKSON: Tony Burke, thank you.
TONY BURKE: Pleasure, thanks.
ELIZABETH JACKSON: That's the new Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Tony Burke.
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