SNUBBED back in February, Liverpool Plains Shire Council mayor Ian Lobsey has vented his frustration as the shire continues to wait for the green light it needs for its farmers to access much-needed emergency drought assistance measures.
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The omission of Liverpool Plains from a list of 20 other shires across the region, including its neighbours, created the ludicrous situation where a farmer in Gunnedah shire could seek assistance, while his neighbour in Liverpool Plains was left out in the cold ... and dry.
Cr Lobsey’s now concerned recent storm events have created the much- maligned “green drought” where a flush of green from an inch of rain can briefly obscure the impacts of months without any or very little.
Farmers shouldn’t be punished for that, he says, and they’re still desperate for the help that has been extended to their neighbours.
This drought has been the first to expose the effectiveness of a new system that scrapped monthly drought declarations under sweeping changes designed to help farmers prepare for and manage the impacts of drought.
New monthly Seasonal Conditions Reports to help farmers prepare for the seasons ahead were introduced early last year, NSW Primary Industries Minister Katrina Hodgkinson saying at the time previous drought policies had not helped farm businesses and rural communities to prepare for the seasonal risks they face.
“Under old systems, farmers had to wait for a district to be ‘drought declared’ in order for a range of subsidies to be triggered, by which stage feed supplies were dwindling, water tanks were low and saleyards were receiving increased numbers of drought-affected stock,” Ms Hodgkinson said.
Not surprisingly the new regime came under increasing attack as conditions worsened across the state throughout last year without triggering any additional assistance measures in areas that were deemed “desperate”.
As for helping farmers “prepare for the seasons ahead”, there is little farmers can do when skies remain stubbornly clear.
It is still taking far too long for governments to react to drought and the new drought preparedness regime has been exposed as just more bureaucratic rhetoric that is leaving farmers, and rural and regional communities, in the lurch.
Cr Lobsey says he has been told the Regional Assistance Advisory Committee has made a decision on his shire’s eligibility for drought assistance, but that decision has yet to be passed on.
The waiting game continues.
