World farmers meet in Australia

Statement by NFF CEO Ben Fargher
THE National Farmers’ Federation will be hosting the 151st Executive Committee meeting of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers (IFAP) next week in Canberra, with delegates travelling from South America, Europe, the Middle East, Canada, Africa and Asia to attend.
The NFF has been involved with IFAP, the world farmers’ organisation, for many years and an active member of its Executive Committee, chairing the OECD Issues Committee (developed country committee), participating in several of its Commodity Committees and contributing to, and supporting, its development work.
NFF’s engagement with IFAP provides Australian farmers with important opportunities to influence international policy development on key issues, including the world food shortage, trade reform, climate change, international carbon accounting rules, risk management and animal welfare.
Despite different production systems and sometimes differences of opinion on issues such as trade reform, overwhelmingly the challenges facing farmers are common the world over – declining farm numbers, the challenges of weather, lack of access to services in rural areas, difficulties accessing markets, the need to access new technology, the research and development task and natural resource scarcity, to name a few.
The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, the Hon Tony Burke, MP, will address the delegates and the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry is sponsoring the event.
At this time, when population is growing globally, demand for food is high, droughts have been prevalent globally and food shortages are a serious problem, it is timely that world farmers are meeting to discuss how they can work together and share from each other’s expertise.