Farmers say tariff on chickpea exports will damage the $1.1 billion industry
$1.1 billion industry feeling hurt of tariff
SOUTHERN Downs farmers say there’s a bigger tariff we should be talking about, but believe the media has turned a blind eye.
While there has been much focus all US President Donald Trump’s proposed 25 per cent tariff on imported steel, Queensland farmers have just copped an even bigger tariff on chickpeas to India.
The 60 per cent tariff on imported chickpeas was imposed by Indian officials on March 1.
Tannymorel chickpea grower Scott Petersen said the coverage of the two issues seemed imbalanced considering the value of the Indian chickpea market far outweighed that of US steel in 2017.
Trump’s proposed tariff is feared to injure the
$400 million steel export market. But family business partner Rod Petersen said the $1.1 billion chickpea market was killed “stone dead” when a 30 per cent chickpea tariff was first imposed in January this year.
“Why is there all this focus on an industry only worth $400 million when the same thing happened to a
$1.1 billion industry?” Scott
❝people Most in the industry knew those prices weren’t going to last.
— Rod Petersen
said. “There seems to be zero focus on an industry worth double the value.”
Scott said the price of chickpeas dropped $20 per tonne in the last two days since Indian officials hiked a 30 per cent tariff on imported chickpeas up to 60 per cent overnight.
Rod said it marked the end of a ‘golden era’ for chickpea growers in 2017, when demand from India sent prices sky-rocketing to around $1000 per tonne.
“It has probably been too good to be true the last two years,” Rod said.
“Most people in the industry knew those prices weren’t going to last, so we’ve come back to earth to a certain extent.”
The sudden tariff increase has come despite Minister for Agriculture David Littleproud’s attempts to strike a better relationship with Indian officials. Mr Littleproud visited India in January this year after the original tariff came into play, negotiating to gain a better line of sight for farmers when market changes came into play. “The decision... demonstrates why this government is constantly focused on developing new markets, particularly to minimise market disruption,” Mr Littleproud said.
Fifty-three chickpea consignments that were in transit when the initial tariff was introduced have since been redirected to other importing countries, including Nepal, Bangladesh, United Arab Emirates, Sri Lanka and Pakistan.
But Rod said this was just the way the Indian officials “seemed to work”.
Scott and Rod Petersen both agreed the state of the market could deter them from planting chickpeas.
“We sold half of our crop to Bangladesh when (prices) spiked a little bit a month ago,” Rod said. “We wish we’d have sold the rest of it because it has dropped quite substantially since then.”