Drought preparedness Seasonal differences aside, overall, the nation’s farmers indicated they felt prepared to navigate the impacts of drought.
“But even the best strategies become harder to execute the more prolonged, and severe, the drought is and there are parts of Queensland and New South Wales that have been facing adverse seasons for a number of years now.” The latest survey, completed in November, found the percentage of Australian farmers expecting conditions in the agricultural economy to deteriorate in the coming 12 months edged back to 40pc – from 56pc who held that view in the September quarter.
Mr Knoblanche said the more positive sentiment in the eastern states had come off the back of good rains, with some drought-affected areas receiving their best falls for the year.
“There have been significant rains in parts of the Darling Downs and south-west Queensland as well as parts of New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania,” he said.
“While it is a good start, and will assist with the planting of the summer crop, it hasn’t been enough to materially improve soil moisture profiles, which remain deficient across much of eastern Australia.” With the rains falling too late to bolster winter crop prospects, he said: “If it were not for the late break in the season over in Western Australia, we would be harvesting the smallest winter crop in two decades – with grain production more than halved in New South Wales and Queensland.” Farm business performance and investment In line with overall confidence levels, the nation’s farmers also revised up expectations for their own gross farm incomes in 2019 – although 42pc still anticipated a weaker financial result, a slight improvement on 49pc with that view in the previous survey.
This saw the WA farming sector holding the greatest investment appetite in the survey, with 34pc of the state’s producers looking to increase investment in their farm business over the coming 12 months – compared to the national average of 18pc.
“October was an exceptionally dry month in Tasmania, but since then, there have been some handy rains and if this continues we would expect to see a bounce in confidence early next year,” Mr Knoblanche said.
In contrast, Mr Knoblanche said three quarters of WA farmers expected the agricultural economy to either improve, or remain stable, with generally good to very good growing conditions experienced after the state’s late break bolstering winter crop prospects to around 15 million tonnes.
Cotton/grain confidence lift By surveyed commodity, confidence was also up across the board – although remained subdued – in all sectors except dairy, which posted a small decline with 55pc of the nation’s dairy farmers expecting conditions to deteriorate over the coming year.
“With the country expected to harvest its smallest winter crop in 10 years, domestic grain prices are likely to remain elevated well into 2019 and this is boding well for those who have been able to get a crop off, with producers also fetching good returns for crops that have had to be cut for hay or silage.” While beef and sheep sentiment also improved, seasonal concerns continued to be ‘front of mind’ as feed costs remain high and graziers face decisions around continuing to feed stock or to further de-stock.