Editorial: Lifting farmer confidence

The survey of 1400 dairy, sheep, beef and arable farmers shows confidence remains stuck in historically low territory.

Farmers have been facing challenging times in recent years – trying hard to earn a living amid high interest rates, low commodity prices and sky-high input costs.

The last term of the Labour Government brought no respite, as an avalanche of regulations was dropped on them from winter grazing to pricing methane emissions.

The Coalition Government provided some relief by unwinding some of Labour’s unfair regulations – like repealing some draconian aspects of winter grazing regulations and promising to keep agriculture out of an emissions trading scheme for the time being.

So, it’s incredibly frustrating to see farmer confidence still sitting at these stubbornly low levels.

The Government have done a lot of work repealing and rewriting some of the most unworkable regulations, but there’s still so much more to be done. But the six-monthly survey clearly shows it’s not only regulation that’s eroding farmer confidence.

There are a whole range of other issues that are also having an impact – including concerns about banking, high interest rates, soft farm-gate prices, the ability to find staff, and the general economic outlook for the country.

The survey also paints a bleak picture of what’s happening with farm profitability - just over a third of farmers are making a loss right now, while only 27% say they’re making a profit and 39% breaking even. If that’s not bad enough, more than half of farmers expect their profitability to decline over the next 12 months.

Feds want to see farmers thriving and feeling confident, not lying in bed stressing about how to pay their bills and keep the lights on.

Because they know that when farmers lose confidence, they cut their spending and shave costs from their business, and that has major flow-on effects for the wider economy.