Introduction:
| The Australian hogindustry is standing at the
eve of a tremendous expansion. In the last 10 years the total of hogfarms
decreased with 75 percent to 4.600, with an average of 90 sows. About 85
percent of the farms belong to hobby-farmers. The average professional, privately
owned hogfarm has well over 400 sows. 95 Percent of the fat hogs is for their
own market. The rest is for export. The expected growth will be especially
found in the export to Asian countries.
Danpork (a Danish/Australian joint venture) started early this year with the construction of a gigantic feed-to- meat farm, with 10.000 sows in the region of Darling Downs in Queensland. Grainco (a co-operation of grainfarmers) is about to start the construction of a hog farm with 8.000 sows. Simular plans are already launched by Taiwan Sugar and Nippon Ham. Nippon Ham, a Japanese enterprise, has already a number of slaughterhouses and beef farms in the states of Queensland and New South Wales. This year also the Argentinian investment company Bunge, will take a farm in use with 23.000 sows. Source: Hogindustry in Australia is characterised by extremes. |
| "One of the positive things about Danpork is that it claims to be creating
500 jobs through building such a super-piggery in the area. But the pork
producers, particularly in the South Burnett, asked me what point there was
in creating 500 jobs if you lost 500 farms because of it."
Source: Senator John Woodley comments on Pork Producers in Queensland |
Earlier this month the Queensland government amended the local Government Act so as to prevent the settlers on the banks of the Condamine River having access to the legal processes.
The following extracts from press cuttings were supplied by Tony Price, a farmer in that area, who expresses the following well-placed concerns:
"Most of the ownership in this Government supported project is Asian (Indonesia and Singapore) there is very little, if any, Australian ownership.
"Apart from the environmental considerations this would also represent what is to me the unacceptable side of Asianisation. This is because this project will compete directly with the Australian family farm. There are also schemes of vertical integration (ie contract farming) the benefits of which to the Australian family farm is yet to be demonstrated.
"Our politicians say our sons can go and work for Asians - I would rather they worked for themselves. This way they can keep their pride and their self-respect. There is no guarantee that locals or even Australians will get a job there.
"The lobby group pushing this 10,000 piggery/abattoir is also pushing a large prison (ie 600 beds) for the area. Although it has been denied - it could happen that the inmates or some of them work there."
Tony wrote a poem:
The Pork Sandwich
I heard some disturbing talk
about a project called Danpork.
Don’t you worry about the smell
it’s so high tech you can’t tell.
Say there’s water there to spare
so throw your hats up in the air.
Now foreign ownership’s all the trend
the smell over there we cannot send.
Ozone friendly - so they say
like the smell of new mown hay.
Tell Shire elections are next year
‘cos glossy brochures in full gear.
Courier Mail December 10th 1997:
Heading “Landholders lose their right to appeal Condamine weir site.”
Landholder’s right to appeal against a Warwick Shire application to reduce the size of a proposed weir on the Condamine River has been removed.
A spokeswoman for the State Local Government and Planning Minister, Mrs Di McCauley, said the right to appeal was removed by an amendment sanctioned by the Minister, to the Local Government Planning and Environment Act.
The spokeswoman said an amendment was made to rectify an “error” by Warwick Shire Council, which specified a 1000 mega-litre weir for the Danpork Australia piggery and associated abattoir, without holding up construction of the project.
Warwick Sire made a rezoning application for a smaller weir of 315 mega-litres, following a recommendation by the Department of Natural Resources.
The rezoning process involved a public notice of the proposal and an invitation for public submissions.
Toowoomba and Regional Environment Council (TREC) co-ordinator Ms Sarah Moles said objectors have argued the smaller weir would not provide sufficient water for the piggery.
“We know that regulating our rivers by building dams and weirs has serious environmental consequences,” she said.
“The weir, which is conspicuously absent from the Water Infrastructure Task Force’s Implementation Plan will compound water quality problems, further interfere with the movement of aquatic species, reduce flows to a section of the river that is already under great stress and mean that existing downstream users have reduced access to their supplies.”
Courier Mail December 9th 1997:
Letter to the editor: “Govt runs on empty”:
The State Government is rendering extraordinary assistance to facilitate a foreign-owned polluting industry in the Murray Darling basin (C-M Dec 6).
The establishment of the Danpork piggery near Pratten, north-west of Warwick, will take water from the river system that cannot be afforded and release effluent which will pollute groundwater.
The passing of the “facilitating” legislation on the last day of parliamentary business takes us back to the Russ Hinze/Joh Bjelke-Petersen days and shows that the Government has learnt nothing from its narrow election success when it received some support from the environmental movement on the basis of its promises.
On the issue of public participation, accountability and care for the environment, the Government has run out of credit and will fall at the next election.
Eric Walker, Brookfield.
Courier Mail, Saturday 6th December 1997.
Heading, “Stink over moves to bar piggery appeals.”
The State Government has circumvented a Darling Downs residents’ group which has been objecting to planning changes for the proposed Au$70 million Danpork piggery.
Landholders in the Pratten and Killarney area near Warwick have accused the Government of withdrawing and public right of appeal, even before the advertised deadline for appeals has closed.
Residents argue that the site chosen for the controversial piggery, which is projected to process 800,000 pigs a year, does not have sufficient water to run an operation of that size.
The Government rushed amendments to the Local Government (Planning and Environment) Act 1990 through Parliament at 3.04am on November 28, the last sitting day of the year.
The legislation effectively wiped out 10 appeals which had been lodged to landholders objecting to a proposal to rezone land to be occupied by the piggery.
Landholders’ spokeswoman Helen Lewis said the Government’s decision was an “appalling betrayal” which had not been seen “since the worst days of Russ Hinze”.
Mrs Lewis, who with her husband John, had been a member of the National Party, said she had been shocked that the Government had been prepared to destroy the democratic rights of residents.
A spokeswoman for the Local Government Minister Di McCauley said the legislative route had been taken because of concern whether the Warwick Shire could rectify a “genuine mistake”.
“So as not to hold up the development which had already gone through rigorous environmental and public scrutiny, the Government sought to assist the Council,” she said.
The legislative change related to a condition in the original agreement between the Council and Danpork that the company be required to construct a weir of approximately 1000 megalitres capacity on the Condamine River “at a location and of a design to the satisfaction of the Department of Primary Industries”.
However the Department of Natural Resources then advised the Council a weir that big could not be built on that part of the Condamine.
In September, the Council decided to seek an amendment under the Local Government (Planning and Environment) Act to reduce the required weir capacity from 1000ML to 300ML. This followed advice from the Department of Local Government and Planning on September 10 that it was “the minister’s strong preference that your council initiate the application as per the provisions of that section of the Act”.