Agriculture the 'safest of bets' for Australia's future, says Year of the Farmer director Philip Bruem

THE time for Australian farmers to stamp their authority on the world stage is now, Australian Year of the Farmer director Philip Bruem says.

The dairy, cropping and sheep farmer from Forbes, NSW, has revealed key elements of a "battleplan" for the farming sector ahead of an address to the state's agriculture industry during the Royal Adelaide Show this week.

"There is a bit of a downturn in mining but there is no downturn in the need for food production and there never will be," Mr Bruem said. "The agriculture industry is the safest of bets."

His strategy for a farming fightback comes as grain growers look ahead to stronger commodity prices due to a world shortage because of ongoing droughts and includes:

IDENTIFYING and developing genuine prime agricultural land near cities.

PROMOTING non-farm based agribusiness and employment opportunities.

SMARTENING up the farmer image.

RECONNECTING city and country communities.

BETTER product labelling to help promote Australian-made goods.

GOVERNMENT incentives for farmers to make the industry more attractive.

Mr Bruem said he "would not knock mining one little bit" because Australia needed to take advantage of the country's resources, and that included minerals in the ground as well as our ability to be world leaders in agriculture.

"It's no longer time for planning ... it's time for action," he said. "Global food production has to increase by 70 per cent in 30 years. It's a growth industry.

"The farmers that are going to be required to produce this food have been born. A failure to capitalise on this now would be one of the greatest blunders of our time."

Mr Bruem will use his visit to the Royal Adelaide Show on Thursday to further promote the Australian Year of the Farmer, which is a launchpad for the movement's One Country program.

Former cricket great Glenn McGrath, who has a farming property in NSW, will also join the Australian Year of the Farmer roadshow and will attend the Show today.

Mr Bruem said he did not subscribe to the fact that Australia was short of water, but that the resource needed to be better managed.

"We have to take a sensible approach to it and conserve some of that water that runs out to the oceans," he said.

"The biggest infringement on agriculture is urban sprawl. If you look at the good agricultural land that's already gone under urban sprawl, it is concerning.

"We've got to take greater stock of those areas that are genuinely prime agricultural land and see what we can do now to protect it.

"It makes sense, for supply chains and work forces, to use the prime land close to cities for agricultural purposes and continue to develop that for agricultural use."

Farming, however, needed to be financially attractive and government incentives were required to achieve that and reduce the urban sprawl land grab.

"There has to be incentives from government for farmers to invest," Mr Bruem said.

"The starting point is to make farming attractive. We need to smarten up our image and get away from the image that farmers are older people stricken by drought.

"The true scene is that farming is a great occupation and profession.

"We also need to show people that you can have a career in agriculture where you don't have to be a farmer ... (but) in science, banking, and agribusinesses that are not on farm."

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Guest Post: Agriculture and Employment in Africa

This is a guest post by Owen Cylke. Mr. Cylke is a development professional and a retired senior foreign service officer with USAID.

This year 10 million young Africans will enter the workforce. This number will continue to increase until 2030 when it will peak at about 18 million annual new entrants to the workforce.

With seventy percent of the African population (and poverty) firmly rooted in rural areas, and development strategies focused on agriculture, will farms be able to absorb these numbers? Demonstrably not.

Africa today is the only region in the world where agriculture continues to play the leading role in economic growth and employment. But subsistence farms are already too small to absorb additional labor. Commercial farms are dependent on improving productivity, by definition labor displacing.

African leaders recognize agricultural employment cannot keep pace with population growth, and are promoting a shift towards manufacturing, and other types of industrial production and services.

What does this mean for public policy? First, that a development strategy focused almost exclusively on agriculture is only half right. True, agriculture is necessary to provide increased food supplies and higher rural incomes. And agriculture will have to play an important role in the transition to other types of economic activity, such as enlarging markets for urban output. But, as noted above, agricultural success carries with it a declining relevance to the growing pool of employment seekers.

Second, a shift from agriculture to industry will not necessarily guarantee enough jobs to meet demand. Today’s labor markets are characterized by informality, inequity, and unreliability – this largely the result of the laissez faire, free market approaches promoted by the international development and economic communities.

Public policy must play a role – a policy regime that extends beyond agriculture (PDF) (and even labor markets themselves) to macroeconomic policy, financial institutions, international economic arrangements, territorial development, demographics, migration and gender policy.

Third, neither the desired sectoral shift nor employment goals will be accomplished automatically. In addition to public policy, they will need an international development and aid strategy that links to and is supportive of that policy.

Today, African thinking and direction stand in uneasy tension with the fixed focus of the international development and economic communities on agriculture and their insistence on the primacy of the market.

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Agriculture industry adds 31,000 jobs over 2011 season

BY MAI HOANG
YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC 

Robust agricultural job growth, expected this time of the season, contributed to a drop in Yakima County’s unemployment rate last month. 

"Our ag employment (looked) good this June," said Don Meseck, regional economist for the state Employment Security Department, which compiles the numbers.

The county reported an unemployment rate of 9.3 percent last month, nearly a percentage point below the 10 percent rate from June 2011, according to preliminary figures released by the state Employment Security Department on Tuesday.

The county’s rate is still above the state rate of 8.2 percent. The state also reported a seasonally adjusted rate, which accounts for seasonal trends such as holiday hiring, of 8.3 percent. The state doesn’t seasonally adjust county rates.

Last month, about 130,180 Yakima County residents were in the labor force, which includes those employed or looking for work. That’s an increase of 3.7 percent from a year ago. 

The number of residents without jobs dropped by 3.4 percent to 12,100 while the number of employed residents increased by 4.5 percent to 118,080.

According to Employment Security, Yakima and Klickitat counties had 31,330 agricultural jobs last month, an increase of 16.6 percent from the same month a year ago. Nearly all those jobs were in Yakima County.

In contrast, growth in nonagricultural jobs was relatively flat. The county reported 77,300 nonagricultural jobs last month, only a 0.4 percent increase, or 300 more jobs, from a year ago, according to Employment Security. 

Several sectors saw healthy increases, including retail trade with 300 more jobs and transportation and warehousing and professional business services with 100 more jobs each. But those increases were offset by declines in other sectors, including construction, which lost 400 jobs year over year, and government, which lost 500 jobs. 

Revised job figures show that Yakima County’s year-over-year job growth has been 0.5 percent or less every month in the first half of 2012. 

"Our nonfarm growth rate has been consistent, but very slow," Meseck said.

Still, the county is on the right track, he said. 

"To sum it up, there’s more good news than bad," he said. "(But) it’s still a slow recovery."

• Mai Hoang can be reached at 509-759-7851 or at maihoang@yakimaherald.com.

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Top agriculture official placed on suspension

The Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries has announced the suspension of director-general Langa Zita

THE Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries announced the suspension of director-general Langa Zita yesterday, but did not elaborate on the reasons, except to say that they were administrative.

Palesa Mokomele, spokesman for the minister, Tina Joemat-Pettersson, said Sipho Ntombela had been appointed acting director-general.

Mr Zita was barely 20 months into the job and had been introduced by Ms Joemat-Pettersson as an appropriate candidate with the required background and skills, since he had been her special adviser on policy.

Ms Joemat-Pettersson has of late been under pressure from various industry players, including red meat and ostrich producers, who suffered losses after disease outbreaks had led to a ban on exports.

In the fisheries sector, the department was forced to appoint an independent committee of inquiry into procurement procedures. This led to the suspension of a company, Sekunjalo , which had won the department’s R800m vessel management contract, on suspicions of political interference and corruption. The Navy had to take over management of the department’s maritime patrol vessels on April 1 for at least a year.

The fleet include the fisheries research vessels Africana, Algoa and Ellen Khuzwayo and the patrol vessels Sarah Baartman, Lilian Ngoyi, Victoria Mxenge and Ruth First.

The Navy’s functions included the crewing of the vessels, the technical management of the vessels (maintenance, repair and life cycle management); provisioning; bunkering; operation; accounting and safety and seaworthiness of the ships.

Agri SA president Johannes Möller said Mr Zita’s suspension did not come as a surprise as his posting was based on the principle of "cadre deployment", which was an unacceptable risk for service delivery.

Mr Zita had worked in the economic cluster of the African National Congress (ANC) and was chairman of Parliament’s environment and tourism portfolio committee.

His relations with commercial farmers’ groupings had been abrasive, with Agri SA describing his manner of addressing the problems of commercial agriculture as "indicative of his ignorance, and sluggish".

Mr Möller said such deployments were unfair to individuals like Mr Zita, who should not have been given such an administratively crucial and strategic position without the necessary expertise in the first place.

The Democratic Alliance’s spokes-woman on agriculture, forestry and fisheries, Annette Steyn, welcomed Mr Zita’s suspension, saying relations between him and the minister appeared to have become increasingly strained while the department’s performance had been subject to consistently heavy criticism.

"The department cannot afford a leadership vacuum, and it is vital that the processes regarding Mr Zita’s suspension are concluded as soon as possible. The agriculture sector, and the many South Africans it employs, cannot afford further uncertainty."

Ms Joemat-Pettersson told journalists in September 2010 Mr Zita’s appointment would bring the right knowledge and understanding to help translate the ANC’s economic policies into the work of her department.

"Under his stewardship, we are confident that (the department) will now knuckle down on the deliverables set for us by President Jacob Zuma , which include: decent employment through economic growth; protect and enhance our environmental assets and natural resources; and facilitate the creation of vibrant, equitable and sustainable rural communities and food security for all."

Mr Zita’s lawyer, Max Boxwana, said the minister had suspended his client without giving reasons, which he had now requested.

radebeh@bdfm.co.za

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Coffee official encourages youths to invest in agriculture

Luanda - The secretary general of the Inter-African Coffee Organisation, Josefa Sacko, on Friday here encouraged the young people to organise themselves in small firms and then focus their activities in the agrarian sector.

Speaking to Angop, the official said the youths mainly the unemployed ones must invest in agriculture sector as it is an area that offers many job opportunities.

She recalled that the Angolan state is granting credits to small and medium companies, and thus the youths should contact the concerned entities so as to have access to these loans.

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Agriculture on the up as farmers diversify

William Emmett

By Debbie Waite

AFTER decades of decline, farming is showing growth, according to the National Farming Union’s (NFU) man on the ground in Oxfordshire.

New government figures show the agriculture and horticulture sector of the economy grew by 25 per cent last year.

Farming now represents the UK’s fourth largest exporting sector, contributing £85bn to the UK economy and employing 3.5 million people.

William Emmett, 61, the regional chairman of the National Farmers’ Union (NFU) says the future is looking brighter in Oxfordshire.

Mr Emmett, who owns four farms in South Oxfordshire, said: “As a fourth generation farmer who has seen decades of decline due to rising prices and disease, I am immensely happy to say that farmers are now cautiously enjoying some measure of prosperity after many hard years.”

He continued: “Most people know that farming’s reputation was badly damaged by BSE and Foot-and-Mouth disease, but the biggest blight has been the steady decline in the margins farmers can make.

“In the last 30 years here in Oxfordshire we have seen potato farming basically disappear, along with most of our pig industry and many of our dairy herds.

“While farmers once were able to make a living from a few hundred acres, the prices they have been offered for their meat and milk have reduced so far that we have seen countless family businesses fold.”

But he said: “Farmers have looked at what people want and diversified – whether that be through opening their farms up to the public, by producing green energy, by offering holiday accommodation, or opening farm shops etc. We know people want good, locally-grown food and we provide that.”

But he added: “There are still many pressures on farmers. Only two weeks ago, one major supermarket suddenly decided it would be paying two pence less a litre for their milk from that point – and all the other supermarkets quickly followed.

“Farmers also use a lot of oil-derived fertilisers, which are always rising in cost.

“But we are hopeful we can weather the future.”

Original Article Here

USAID’s agribusiness project to create 1.3m jobs

Karachi—Andrew Sisson Mission Director USAID has stated that various agribusiness projects (funded by the American people through USAID & implemented by Agribusiness Support Fund - ASF) some 1.3 million jobs would be generated. He was speaking at a MoU signing ceremony between Sindh Enterprise Development Fund (SEDF) & USAID’s ASF for cooperation in the areas of agriculture & agribusiness sector with particular focus on small & medium enterprises, held here on Wednesday.

Andrew Sisson noted though 21% GDP, 44% labor force & 70% of Pakistan’s exchange earnings was allied with agriculture, yet that & livestocksectors here were characterized by non-efficient production. He stressed on the importance of increasing productivity through adoption of new farming techniques & technological innovation. Commenting on the outcome of this 5-year 90-million-dollar Agribusiness Project he said that technical assistance programs targeted 62,500 farmers & 2,500 agribusinesses; leveraged investment was upto $320 million by the private sector through the provision of cost-sharing support to 45,000 farmer enterprise group members, 100 associations & cooperatives, 250 individual/corporate farmers, 140 SME’s & eight lead companies. ASF has teamed with an international organization CNFA for provision of expertise in relevant program implementation themes. He said that one of the objectives of the project was to strengthen the capacity in horticulture & livestock value chains to increase to domestic & foreign markets. Calling private sector the drivers of change, Andrew said USAID was working with “dynamic, vibrant, incredibly entrepreneurial & philanthropic private segment”.

Answering to a question regarding the change USAID had made so far Andrew informed that USAID was focused on 5 priority areas: energy, economic growth, agriculture, education & health. Quoting a few results achieved by USAID in the last couple of years he told they had added 450 mw of electricity benefiting 6 million Pakistanis (& in the next couple of years expect to add another 800 mw to the grid) - this include investments in three dams & renovating three power plants; support had been provided to 80,000 micro-entrepreneurs (mostly women - many in the dairy, working withcompanies like Engro & Nestle) who were getting more money & exposure now; USAID was in the process of financing construction of 600,000 acres of irrigation canals (& plan to increase it to a million acres in few years) benefiting hundreds of thousands of families; major investments had been made in FATA & KP where recently over 400 km of world-class roads had been made; construction of 215 km of road in South Waziristan just finished (“it is not an easy place to work”!). He told that due to the roads business was picking up in South Waziristan.

USAID Mission Director went on to inform that USAID (had been working for decades here as far as higher education was concerned: supported the creation of LUMS & IBA; helped set up several agricultural colleges…That tradition continues &) had just signed an agreement with HEC to establish three centers in three universities for agriculture, water and energy studies (these universities would be linked with American universities so that they could share knowledge). In basic education USAID had built hundreds of schools and the Sindh Minister of education had told Andrew that schools built a quarter century ago were still standing. He said that USAID would build hundreds of more schools and the bottom-line objective was to educate 3.2 millions kids. He told that USAID had launched National Literacy Campaign & had placed Basic Education Program in Sindh. Commenting on the health sector he said that USAID worked with lady health workers & built hospitals (two projects are under construction presently in Karachi & Jacobabad). He told that one of the foremost objectives of USAID was to reduce child mortality. Andrew further informed that USAID was currently renovating systems for provision of clean drinking water in Jacobabad & Peshawar. Earlier USAID had provided clean drinking water to half of the population of FATA.

Chairman Sindh Board of Investment Zubair Motiwala who is also heading Sindh Enterprise Development Fund (SEDF) said that in less then two years SEDF had identified & financed 13 areas & more were in the pipeline.

Original article Here

Happy Birthday, U.S. Department of Agriculture

By Debra J. Groom / The Post-Standard 

Today is the 150th anniversary of the founding of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Agriculture Secretary Thomas Vilsack wrote this to mark the day:

Washington, D.C. -- On May 15, we will recognize the 150th anniversary of the founding of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. On that date in 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed into law an act of Congress establishing USDA.

Two and a half years after he established the Department, in what would be his final annual message to Congress, Lincoln called USDA "The People's Department."

President Lincoln knew the importance of agriculture to our prosperity – particularly at a time when about half of all Americans lived on the farm. And while that number today stands at about 2 percent, our values are still rooted in rural America.

As the United States has changed and evolved over the years, at USDA we have not lost sight of Lincoln’s vision. Through our work on food, agriculture, economic development, science, natural resource conservation and a host of other issues, USDA has impacted the lives of generations of Americans.

And over the past three years, we have furthered that commitment to this nation.

USDA has supported producers – making a record number of farm loans, maintaining a strong safety net, and expanding markets to drive record exports.

We’ve stood by rural communities – supporting more than 6,000 community facilities projects, providing more than 50,000 loans to help rural businesses create jobs, and investing in thousands of infrastructure projects that have delivered modern broadband, water and electric services to millions.

We’ve enrolled a record number of acres in conservation programs, and laid out a sensible new planning rule for 193 million acres of National Forests to promote job growth while conserving the environment.

USDA has continued its history of groundbreaking research. For example, we’ve invested about $320 million to accelerate research on the next generation of renewable energy – so we can create jobs and ensure America’s energy security for years to come.

And we’re helping families lead healthy lives. USDA provides nutrition assistance for one in four Americans, enabling them to put healthy meals on the table, even when times are tough, and we’re serving healthier school breakfast and lunch to 32 million kids a day.

Today, USDA truly remains a “Peoples’ Department” that touches the life of every American. Folks depend on us. That’s why I’m committed to leveraging the efforts of our Department and more than 100,000 hardworking USDA employees to continue creating jobs, supporting rural communities and helping our country prosper.

As we commemorate 150 years of accomplishments, USDA is looking forward to addressing the changing needs of agriculture and rural America.

For our small towns and communities looking to compete in a globalizing world, we’ll be there with access to broadband, critical infrastructure and support for new businesses.

USDA will continue its support for the next generation of renewable fuels and help promote advanced, bio-based products.

And we’ll keep working closely with America’s agricultural producers to maintain a dependable safety net for their work – which ultimately is connected to 1 in 12 American jobs – and ensure the food supply we need to feed a growing world population.

I hope Americans will join us in our commemoration of 150 years of USDA. This is a great time to learn about this Department’s contributions to the strength of our nation, and to see how we can continue to partner with Americans working to provide a better life for their families.

I invite everyone to visit this government website link to learn more about USDA’s history and our plans for the future – as the “Peoples’ Department” continues serving all Americans, every day and every way.

Original Article Here

Tough image blights agriculture studies

By: AAP

A POOR perception of life on the land has led to a sharp decline in the number of universities offering agricultural courses in Australia.

Just nine Australian universities now provide agricultural studies - down from from 23 ten years ago.

Low demand for places stems largely from misconceptions among students and parents, Professor Terry Spithill from La Trobe University's agriculture faculty said in a submission to a parliamentary Senate committee hearing in Melbourne today.

While many associated life on the land with bank foreclosures on farms and market collapses for key farm commodities, in reality job prospects in the sector were "tremendous".

In northwest Victoria, not one person had applied for more than 30 vacancies for crop agronomists offering salaries ranging from $40,000 to $55,000.

Across the country 4000 agriculture-related positions needed to be filled each year, but only 300 students were studying agricultural degrees.

Giving evidence to the Education, Employment, Workplace References Committee, Professor Spithill said the agricultural sector had failed to promote itself.

He recommended more agricultural scholarships and cadetships be offered to help boost student numbers.

The Education, Employment and Workplace Relations Committee is due to table its findings in the Senate on June 8.

Original Article Here