Price rise tipped to hit farm produce

A $ 1.2 BILLION farming sector has been dealt significant losses from Severe Tropical Cyclone Debbie which will translate into higher prices for produce such as tomatoes and capsicums in shops around Australia, industry groups say.

Organisations Canegrowers and Queensland Farmers Federation are still trying to assess the extent of the damage but say the storm has cut a swathe through a 300km- wide stretch of North Queensland farms which produce major crops in sugar cane, tomatoes, capsicums, peas, beans, pumpkins, zucchini and eggplant as well as mango and avocado trees.

They warn there could be further losses in central and southern Queensland grain and cotton crops from flooding being caused by the storm which is now a tropical low.

“There’s been a significant loss of tomatoes and capsicums,” Queensland Farmers Federation project manager Ross Henry said yesterday.

“About 90 to 95 per cent of Australia’s winter tomato and capsicum crop comes from the region. It’s a bit of a food bowl of Queensland. It’s likely as supply decreases that the prices will go up.”

Canegrowers CEO Dan Galligan said farming communities had endured almost 36 hours of storm conditions from a slow- moving system and yesterday were still being hampered by heavy rain.

“It has been an anxious and stressful time and we know there will be some damage to houses and sheds,” he said.

“We do know that hundreds of hectares of sugar cane has been flattened by Cyclone Debbie’s winds with the Mackay and Proserpine districts the worst affected.

“Some of the cane will have been snapped or pulled up by the roots and some of it is underwater. The full extent of the damage to farms and the crop won’t be clear for a number of days.”

Last year the Mackay and Proserpine regions produced about 8.5 million tonnes of sugar cane, out of a statewide harvest of 35 million tonnes, worth about $ 850 million. The horticulture crop around Bowen is worth $ 420 million.

Mr Galligan said farm equipment and industry infrastructure such as the cane train network and the sugar mills in the hardest hit cane districts would be inspected over the coming days.

He said Canegrowers’ insurance managers were ready to assist growers with farm and personal infrastructure claims and had the support of insurance providers.