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Farming's future lies outside the gate
9 Jun 2004
Part-time farmers who earn a large part of their incomes off their farms are set to outnumber their full-time counterparts, according to the Australian Farm Institute. The situation has come about because farms with annual outputs of less than $200,000 are usually not viable without off-farm income.
The number of commercially viable farm businesses has fallen by about 15 per cent over the past 12 years. The ones which remain viable usually have large-scale production, farm consolidation and fewer farmers. The only alternative for smaller farms is to supplement farm incomes with off-farm wages - which the institute sees as a positive trend, as the sector is not so exposed to commodity price collapses or droughts.
The institute divided Australian agriculture into three tribes: the "hunter-gatherers", big broadacre farmers with more than $200,000 of agricultural output a year; "control freaks" with smaller but more intensive operations such as pork, dairy, poultry and horticulture; and "weekend warriors", farmers with less than $100,000 a year of output who allocate an increasing amount of hours to off-farm employment.
Sydney Morning Herald, 9/6/04.
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