Getting real about change
IT WAS the millennium drought that made Peter Holding sit up and take notice of the changing climate.
“Before the millennium drought we used to have 12 to 18-month droughts. Around here it was pretty rare not to be able to grow a crop,” the third-generation mixed farmer from southern New South Wales says.
“The ’82 drought went from spring to the next spring, and then it broke. It caused all sorts of problems – there was dust flying around everywhere and dust blanketing Melbourne – but it only went for a bit over 12 months. The millennium drought started in about 2002 and just got drier and drier (until it broke in 2010).
“So instead of one drought year in 10 we suddenly had nine years (of drought) in 10. It made you realise something had to change.”
It prompted Peter to become involved with Climate Champions – an initiative of, among others, the Bureau of Meteorology, Meat and Livestock Australia and the Grains Research and Development Corporation to help farmers adapt to the shifting climate, in the form of measures such as direct drilling and controlled traffic or precision farming to make the most of valuable soil moisture.
It has since morphed into the Farmers for Climate Action group, of which Peter is on the board of directors.
He is also a spokesman for the organisation, a member of Climate Kelpie, which collates information for farmers seeking to manage the risks and impact of climate change, and addressed the recent ABARES Outlook conference in Canberra.
SOLID FOUNDATION
PETER runs a mixed cropping, merino and prime lamb business across 283ha at Harden and 1012ha of leased country further west at Cootamundra. The Harden property was purchased as an 810ha holding by Peter’s grandparents in 1932.
On the cropping front, Peter grows wheat, but with yields struggling in more marginal country at Cootamundra, there is more of a push to barley. Canola is also grown on some of the hilly country, as the flatter country “gets too wet in wet winters and gets too frosted in dry winters”.
The merino flock is a Merryville-type with classed-out ewes joined to White Suffolk rams. Peter breeds his own rams using artificial insemination and in the
past has used bloodlines from The Grange in Western Australia and Centre Plus at Tullamore in NSW.
With his sheep he is focused strongly on improving genetics.
“Everyone classes their flock and takes out about 30 per cent, but if you don’t take out about 60 per cent you really can’t make any genetic gain,” Peter said.
“The ewes that come out of the bottom flock never make it back into the top flock. It keeps the genetics moving.”
MOVING FORWARD
WHEN it comes to climate change Peter said farmers needed to look past just adaptation and make some real changes to their operations.
“Adaptation is a symptom of where we’ve got to in this whole debate,” Peter said.
“You can change your variety, you can do direct drilling, or you can go to controlled traffic and precision farming, and all these things will help you get a better yield and all the rest of it. But since about 2010 yields have stalled.
“Farmers haven’t stopped adapting and the only reason yields haven’t fallen is because they are adapting.”
He said farmers needed to stick their “heads up above the parapet and have a look around and say ‘we need to transform this system and we need to do it fast because we’re just going to run out of adaptive ability’”.
Peter said farmers should pay a tax on emissions to encourage them to make changes.
“There’s lot of things we can do ... we could go to electric tractors or we could go to SWARM (robotic) technology,” he said.
“Even in the ruminant sector, there are plenty of scientists out there now working on the ruminant bacteria microbes to change them to ones that don’t produce so much methane. And every bit of methane we stop them burping goes into meat production so we get more efficient at the same time.”
Peter said he found that the more traditional the agriculture sector, or “the more pressure it is under” the less they accept climate change as being real.
“The merino industry, for argument’s sake, I find impossible to talk to about climate change because nothing ever changes in that industry, so how can it be climate?” he said.
“I find the marginal areas pretty much in the same boat but I think their issue is the pressure of debt and bills and things.
“They don’t really want to know about climate change because if they thought about it logically they’d probably think they were finished.”
❝ It made you realise something had to change.
— Peter Holding