Farmers’ food warning as they’re forced to abandon paddocks due to lack of fuel

Some farmers are now forgoing planting crops this season, a move that could trigger a nationwide food crisis for months.

Already facing fertilizer shortages, some are now choosing to give up on potential crops just to save what’s left of their livelihoods and shrinking profit margins.

They exploit all resources as far as they can in an uphill battle that only gets steeper.

“How do we know that if we grow a crop we will have fuel to harvest it, so that is in the back of everyone’s mind,” said Parkes farmer Wayne Dunford.

It is the beginning of the growing season. There is no rain, there is no fertilizer and fuel prices are skyrocketing.

It’s a turbulent trifecta that forces some to abandon pastures that would have been sown with winter grains, a decision that is rarely made.

“I’ve been here for 60 years, but I’ve never done it,” Dunford said.

The price of diesel has now doubled to more than 3 dollars per liter.

Urea, a fertilizer extracted from gas and oil, is now at disastrously low levels and what remains is exorbitantly expensive.

Analysts say the spike in fuel prices is yet to come unless the war in the Middle East ends.

The government claims there is enough fuel, but those who literally feed the country say it is not where it is needed.

Nicholson Petroleum, which provides on-farm deliveries to hundreds of farmers around Forbes, is at a standstill.

“Before all this started, we had already booked more than 120,000 to 150,000 liters to go to the farmers. We now need more than 300,000 liters,” says Sonya Drabsch from the company.

“Now is a crucial time for farmers. They need the fuel not only now, but weeks ago.

“We have no fuel, we have run out of fuel twice now.”

The independent supplier has to deliver bad news every day to farmers who come by asking: “When will the fuel come?”

“They had to go to the bigger servos and they were sent away with their pods because you’re not allowed to fill the pods,” she said.

Richard Smith, who supplies the fuel to farms spread over hundreds of miles, said they are even missing orders

“On Monday we had received 46,000, it was diverted because someone else paid more money than us,” he said.

Chris Groves in Cowra uses his fuel sparingly, cutting back on the wheat and oilseed rape he sows but replacing them with grazing varieties.

“We will see the long-term consequences of this later in the supermarkets and in the community,” he warned.

Ed Fagan of Mulyan is skipping winter grains altogether, instead relying on his beets, which rely on water pumped by diesel.

“It’s not knowing when the next delivery is coming and you know we use diesel every day, I can’t stop it,” he said.

Whether planting, irrigating or harvesting, more than 85 percent of farms across the country depend on diesel.

Farmers say this is the wake-up call Australia needs to prioritize our reserves over exports.

“Our competitors in Canada and the US, Europe and Russia all have lower production costs than we do,” Fagan said.

‘Most of them make their own oil and gas, so they have an advantage over us.

“So we are in a position where we are probably the most vulnerable of all the agricultural countries on the planet.”

Groves added: “We need to be able to find fuel, we need some kind of measure to say that fuel per crop will not exceed X amount of dollars.

“That would give some people the confidence to go ahead and plant a crop.”

The situation is bad now, and the fear is that it will only get worse. Farmers are bitter.

“I probably put more emphasis on what the analysts say than on the politicians because, you know, they lie for a living, so why would you believe them on this,” Fagan said.