Communities `sacrificed' to carbon sinks

Stapleton, John. Weekend Australian [Canberra, A.C.T] 06 Dec 2008: 2.

Abstract

By altering land use patterns and locking up millions of hectares in carbon sinks, rural Australia is being made the "sacrificial lamb" for Kevin Rudd's emissions trading system, said Mick Keogh, head of the Australian Farm Institute.

"The resulting reduction in farm output would have a significant impact on food prices, as well as major socio-economic impacts," he said. "This is the dark underside of the glossy and optimistic conclusions about the potential costs of an ETS."

Greens senator Christine Milne applauded Senator [Nash]. Senator Milne said the Prime Minister must explain to the people of regional Australia "why he is determined to drive them off the land and further undermine the viability of their communities with another tax rort for plantations dressed up as climate change policy".

Full Text

TURNING tens of millions of hectares of prime agricultural land into carbon sink forests to fight climate change would dramatically increase food costs, destroy rural communities and take substantial amounts of water out of Australian river systems.

These views led to traditional enemies -- the Greens and the Nationals -- combining this week with rural industry figures to condemnthe Rudd Government's passing of laws to provide generous tax concessions for carbon sink forestry plantations.

While alarm over the destruction of farming land to create forests is widespread, expressing such concerns cost the Nationals' former shadow parliamentary secretary for water resources Fiona Nash her job this week.

Senator Nash crossed the floor and was forced to resign from the front bench. She said she could not betray her rural constituents by voting for bad legislation.

Nationals Senate leader Barnaby Joyce told The Weekend Australian the law was "completely mad -- akin to an art movie. You don't know whether to be shocked or to laugh. It is outrageous when the major threat to rural communities is not the international economy but domestic tax policy".

Greens senator Christine Milne applauded Senator Nash. Senator Milne said the Prime Minister must explain to the people of regional Australia "why he is determined to drive them off the land and further undermine the viability of their communities with another tax rort for plantations dressed up as climate change policy".

While welcomed by the National Association of Forestry Industries, which praised the Government for standing up to the Greens, theNational Farmers Federation expressed serious concerns.

Mr Keogh said under an emissions reduction target of 25 per cent by 2020, about 34 million hectares would be converted into permanent carbon sink forests -- 30 per cent more than the total land sown to crops each year.

Robert Belcher, chairman of Sustainable Agricultural Communities Australia, has been speaking out against the tax schemes at meetings around Australia for the past year.

"As soon as you take a farm, you take a family, you take kids out of school, money out of the local community," he said.

"We have had to work really hard to get the average punter to realise he's been dudded."

A white paper on the final design of the scheme is due to be released on December 15.

RURAL BITE

Size of agricultural land to be turned into carbon sink forests

AAA = -

BBB = 2007-2012 '000 ha

CCC = 2013-2022 '000 ha

DDD = 2023-2032 '000 ha

EEE = 2033-2042 '000 ha

FFF = 2043-2050 '000 ha

GGG = 2007-2050 '000 ha

AAA .... BBB ... CCC .... DDD ... EEE .... FFF .... GGG

NSW ... 0 ........ 3521 ... 3521 .... 3521 ... 2817 ... 13,381

Vic ...... 0 ........ 65 ....... 65 ....... 65 ....... 52 ...... 247

Qld ...... 0 ........ 3989 ... 3989 ... 3989 .... 3191 ... 15,159

SA ...... 0 ........ 244 ..... 244 ..... 244 ...... 195 ..... 925

WA ..... 0 ........ 610 ..... 610 ..... 610 ...... 488 ..... 2317

Tas ...... 0 ........ 2 ........ 2 ......... 2 ........ 1 ......... 7

NT ....... 0 ........ 525 ..... 525 ..... 525 ..... 420 ..... 1997

Aus ..... 0 ........ 8956 ... 8956 .... 8956 ... 7165 ... 34,033

Source: ABARE

Credit: John Stapleton

ORIGINAL COPY

John Stapleton
TURNING tens of millions of hectares of prime agricultural land into carbon sink forests to fight climate change, as envisaged in Treasury modelling of the costs of the Rudd Governments proposed emissions trading scheme (ETS), would dramatically reduce the amount of land available for farming, increase food costs, destroy rural communities and take substantial amounts of water out of Australian river systems.

These views were strongly expressed this week when The Greens combined with their traditional enemies The Nationals as well as leading rural industry figures, to condemn the Rudd government's passing of legislation to provide generous tax concessions for ``carbon-sink'' forestry plantations.

While alarm over the destruction of prime farming land to create carbon sink forests is widespread across rural Australia, expressing such concerns cost the Liberal's former-shadow parliamentary secretary for water resources Fiona Nash her job this week when she crossed the floor over the issue and was then forced to resign.

She crossed the floor to join The Greens and The nationals in voting against the proposals, contained in amendments to the Tax Act, and was then sacked by Opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull.

This is the view of many rural Australians, who see regional Australia potentially becoming the sacrificial lamb that will be used to minimise the impacts of the ETS on the rest of the Australian economy.

The legislation has evolved from the Howard Government's Managed Investment Scheme (MIS) arrangements for forestry plantations, originally designed to encourage increased forest plantations, and to reduce Australian reliance on timber harvested from old growth native forests. Under this legislation, two million hectares of farm land has been transformed into plantations and attracted heavy criticism for the negative impacts on rural areas.

Greens and The Nationals have combined to vote against the legislation providing generous tax concessions for carbon sink forests. Their opposition to the legislation is being supported by many senior rural figures.

What is the government's response to their claims that:turning tens of millions of hectares of prime agricultural land into carbon sink forests to fight climate change, as envisaged in Treasury modelling, would dramatically reduce the amount of land available for farming, increase food costs, destroy rural communities and take substantial amounts of water out of Australian river systems?

The Treasury modelling on the cost of an ETS and the claim that it would only cost the average citizen one dollar a day was based on the assumption that millions of hectares would be converted into carbon-sink forests. A 25% target for instance shows that 34 million hectares would be converted into forest. Is the government concerned at the impacts both nationally and in rural areas on taking such large quantities of agricultural land out of production?

Head of the Nationals Barnaby Joyce condemned the legislation as ``completely mad - akin to an art movie - you don't know whether to be shocked or to laugh.''

He said through the generous tax deducations for forestry plantations the government was providing upfront tax deductions to major greenhouse emitters.

``The Rudd government is putting up the tax burden on the community, reducing the sustainability of regional economies and inspiring businesses to move overseas. It is outrageous when the major threat to rural communities is not the international economy but domestic tax policy.''

Greens Senator Christine Milne applauded Senator Nash for her stand and said the Prime Minister must explain to the people of regional Australia ``why he is determined to drive them off the land and further undermine the viability of their communities with another tax rort for plantations dressed up as climate change policy.''

Leading research body The Australian Farm Institute has highlighted this issue in recent research reports. Head Mick Keogh said a major factor in recently released Treasury modelling of the cost of the Rudd governments ETS was an assumption that vast swags of farm land would be converted into carbon-sink forests. This enabled the modelling to conclude that the ETS would only cost the average citizen one dollar a day.

He said the Treasury had relied on modelling work by Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics, which examined the the consequences of various emissions targets. Under a reduction target of 25% by 2020 some 34 million hectares of agricultural land would be converted into permanent carbon sink forests. To put this area into perspective, this is 30 per cent more land than the total area of Australian farm land sown to crops each year.

AFI head Mick Keogh said from the Treasury perspective the inclusion of such a large volume of carbon sequestration by newly-planted trees had the result of greatly reducing the projected cost to the Australian economy of the ETS. Locking up carbon in trees was much less expensive than the assumed cost of directly reducing emissions from coal-fired electricity generators.

``Trees grow bigger and faster on the best farming land where rainfall is plentiful,'' he said. ``The resulting reduction in farm output would have a significant impact on food prices in Australia, as well as major socio-economic impacts on the regions in question. The ability of Australia to continue producing its own food or supplying water to towns and cities have been ignored in discussions about the ETS, and are the dark underside of the glossy and optimisitc conclusions that have been reached about its minimal potential costs.''

Turning tens of millions of hectares of prime agricultural land into carbon sink forests to fight climate change, as is being proposed by the Rudd government, could have disastrous consequences for the nation by dramatically reducing the amount of land available for farming, increasing the cost of food, destroying rural communities and taking substantial amounts of water out of the river system.

Concern over the future of rural Australia has led to an unusual alliance of The Greens and The Nationals, who have combined to condemn legilsation providing generous tax concessions for forestry plantations as nothing but a tax rort.

Their primary fear is that the patchwork quilt of colourful family and company owned farms that make up Australia's prime agricultural regions will become bleak monoculture vistas of forest after forest.

Their claims are backed by leading figures in the rural industry, including The Australian Farm Institute.
They say that under the scenario proposed by Rudd for an emissions trading scheme the highly unionised coal industry will in effect get away from having to reduce their emissions through a combination of free permits, paying overseas countries not to produce emissions and generous tax concessions to invest in plantations, thereby transferring the cost to the taxpayer and farmers.

While fears over the destruction of prime farming land to create carbon sink forests are widespread across rural Australia, expressing them cost former-shadow parliamentary secretary for water resources and conservation Fiona Nash her job this week, when she crossed the floor in defiance of the Liberals to vote against the proposals, contained in amendments to the Tax Act. She was then sacked from her position by Opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull.

But both the Greens and the Nationals have praised Nash for her courage. Head of the Nationals Barnaby Joyce condemned the legislation as ``completely mad - akin to an art movie - you don't know whether to be shocked or to laugh.''

He said the Rudd government was providing upfront tax deductions to major emitters such as the coal industry while at the same time removing the economies of regional towns and driving up the cost of food. ``The Rudd government is putting up the tax burden on the community, reducing the sustainability of regional economies and inspiring businesses to move overseas. It is outrageous when the major threat to rural communities is not the international ecoonomy but domestic tax policy.''

Australian Farm Institute head Mick Keogh claimed yesterday that the only way the Rudd government could announce, based on its Treasury modelling, that climate change would only cost the average citizen one dollar a day to fight was under the assumption that vast swags of land would be converted to carbon forest sinks.

The Treasury report incorporated the results of modelling work carried out by ABARE, which examined the the consequences of various emissions target. Under a target of 25% by 2020, decried by some environmentalists as too little, would see approximately 34 million hectares of agricultural land converted into permanent carbon sink forests. This would occur because, as emissions prices rise, it becomes more profitable for landholders to grow trees than to raise crops or livestock.

Mick Keogh, director of the Institute, said to put this into perspective, this was 30 per cent more land than the total area of Australian farm land that is sown to crops each year. He said farmers could not compete with huge city based plantation companies.

He said from the Treasury perspective the inclusion of this volume of carbon sequestration from trees had the result of greatly reducing the projected cost to the Australian economy of the ETS. Locking up carbon in trees was much less expensive than the assumed cost of directly reducing emissions from coal-fired electricity generators.

ABARE modelling identified that the farm land to be converted into forests would not be low-value land in drier areas, but the highly productive land in high rainfall regions - especially in south-east NSW and south-east Queensland.

``Trees grow bigger and faster on the best farming land where rainfall is plentiful,'' he said. ``The reduction in farm output from this area would have a significant impact on food prices in Australia, as well as major socio-economic impacts on the regions in question. The ability of Australia to continue producing its own food or supplying water to towns and cities have been ignored in discussions about the ETS, and are the dark underside of the glossy and optimisitc conclusions that have been reached about its minimal potential costs.''

Senator Milne claimed the law was slipped through parliament without appropriate debate provided investors an up front 100 per cent tax deducation on their costs in establishing a plantation with no requirement that the trees be kept in the ground.

She said the law would not, as the government claimed, result in native vegetation being established in marginal areas. ``Marginal land does not produce healthy, fast-growing forests,'' she said. ``These trees will be established no prime agricultural land, buying up water rights and driving mroe families off the land. Regional communities have already been destroyed by plantation companies taking advantage of the tax benefits of Managed Investment Schemes, buying off family farms which do not receive the same preferential tax treatment. As families are driven away, communities lose schools, doctors, local processing and postel runs.''

Robert Belcher, Chairman of Sustainable Agricultural Communities Australia, has speaking out against the tax schemes at public meetings around Australia. He said tax driven business instruments to promote plantations removed the ability of rural communities to create wealth for themselves.

``As soon as you take a farm you take a family kids out of school, money going into that local community,'' he said. ``It is not going to reduce carbon in the atmosphere; the only way you can do it is actually reduce the emissions. The finance sector has been positioning itself to get hold as much land as they can to put the forests in, because that is the currency for the ETS to get up and running. We have had to work really hard to get the average punter to realise he's been dudded. It's acting as a cover for the coal industry to go ahead full bore as usual.''

RESPONSE: WONG. LEFT MESSAGE.
RESPONSE: LIBS. LEFT MESSAGE.
RESPONSE: NFF. LEFT MESSAGE.

CARBON SINK FORESTS (Stapleton): TURNING tens of millions of hectares of prime agricultural land into carbon sink forests to fight climate change, as envisaged in Treasury modelling of the costs of the Rudd Governments proposed emissions trading scheme (ETS), would dramatically reduce the amount of land available for farming, increase food costs, destroy rural communities and take substantial amounts of water out of Australian river systems. These views led to the joining together this week of traditional enemies The Greens and The Nationals, as well as leading rural industry figures, to condemn the Rudd government's passing of legislation to provide generous tax concessions for ``carbon-sink'' forestry plantations. Fiona Nash lost her job as opposition water spokesman as a result of crossing the floor on the issue. The Treasury modelling on the cost of an ETS and the claim that it would only cost the average citizen one dollar a day was based on the assumption that millions of hectares would be converted into carbon-sink forests. ABARE modelling shows for instance that a 25% target would see 34 million hectares converted into forest. This is more than the 25 million presently under cultivation and as the Treasury shows, much of this loss of agricultural land would be in NSW and Queensland, which has the best pasture land suitable for forests.

THE JOURNALISM OF JOHN STAPLETON

Pages

Saturday, 6 December 2008