Minutes/Policy Development Committee/Agriculture and Food WG/2014-03-24

Agenda

 * Acknowledgement of country
 * Aims of WG
 * Discussion
 * Timeline: what is a suitable process?
 * Frequency of meetings, when is next meeting?

Attendance

 * Laura Killian
 * Mark Gibbons
 * Brendan Molloy
 * Andrew Downing
 * Mozart Olbrycht-Palmer

Apologies

 * Simon Frew

Acknowledgement of country

 * Laura: "I'd like to start of by acknowledging that we are meeting on lands which Indigenous peoples were/are traditional custodians of. I'd like to acknowledge that most of these lands were stolen and have not been returned. I think it is important, particularly when discussing agricultural policy, to keep in mind this ongoing historical context."

Aims of WG

 * To create an agricultural & food policy.

Discussion

 * Identified issues:
 * Seed patents
 * Loss of biodiversity (already covered to some extent by existing policies)
 * Drought (including climate change and longer droughts)
 * Loss of farmland due to changes in use (e.g. mining) (mining vs farming covered to some extent by existing policies)
 * Economic imbalance resulting from small number of dominant food distributors controlling all of the farming
 * General corporate control aspect.
 * Predominance of monocultures
 * Poisoning of pollinators such as bees and loss of habitat
 * http://www.apvma.gov.au/news_media/chemicals/neonics.php
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neonicotinoid
 * http://blogs.unimelb.edu.au/sciencecommunication/2013/10/12/where-have-all-the-bees-gone/
 * Encouraging permacultures
 * Subsidy might be a good method
 * A biodiversity fund, administered by a scientific committee, with the job of supporting sustainable practices in key areas?
 * Going anti-neonicotinoid as a policy seems presumptious given all the science that seems to be going on in the space.
 * Something that encourages non-risky farming practises like permaculture on the other hand could be more straightforward and positive.
 * Economic issues — permaculture may tend to be more labour intensive (compared to fully automatable mono-culture farming).
 * Avoid binary solutions to complex problems.
 * Funds are good options because they are self-administered once the money is granted and are independent of political interference.
 * Polinators are an integral part of any farming system.
 * Possible approach: a basic income to safeguard the industry, a biodiversity fund to support sustainable practices, a feed-in tariff to encourage farmers to broaden their business model into renewable energy provision, and helping farmes set up some kind of coop to match major supermarkets.
 * A feed-in tariff promotes renewable energy production by giving farmers a long-term contract with utility companies if they build turbines or solar.
 * Transportation for trade vs local production.
 * Urban agriculture movements.
 * Food cooperatives.
 * Suicide rate of farmers
 * http://ruralhealth.org.au/sites/default/files/fact-sheets/fact-sheet-14-suicide%20in%20rural%20australia_0.pdf
 * http://www.farmweekly.com.au/news/agriculture/general/news/rural-suicide-trend-alarming/2687171.aspx
 * Biochar
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biochar
 * Seems to fix several problems concurrently.
 * Sequesters carbon in quantities large enough to reverse global warming, improves soil, gives farmers secondary sources of income.
 * There are likely many alternative farming and fertilization techniques.
 * Need to find the right technique for the particular block of land.
 * http://www.csiro.au/Organisation-Structure/Flagships/Sustainable-Agriculture-Flagship/Biochar-Overview/Biochar-Research.aspx
 * http://www.csiro.au/~/media/CSIROau/Flagships/Sustainable-Agriculture-Flagship/Biochar-factsheets/NBI-I%20detailed%20scientific%20report_26_06_2012.ashx
 * http://www.business.vic.gov.au/industries/science-technology-and-innovation/programs/driving-business-innovation/market-validation-program/portable-biochar-maker
 * http://www.daff.gov.au/climatechange/cfi/biochar/grant-program-guidelines
 * CSIRO could do more to investigate land management.
 * Organic and biodynamic alternatives to consider:
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodynamic_agriculture#Studies_of_efficacy
 * Should create a new "environmental and land" policy and merge this new policy with the old environment policy.
 * General agreement that this is the likely course of action.

Timeline

 * Proposed timeline:


 * 1) Compile lists of resources
 * 2) Read
 * 3) Discuss
 * 4) Draw links between them
 * 5) Look at different perspectives and motives
 * 6) Evaluate


 * Next step is to search out decent resources and paste them in the pad
 * Put in a few lines of detail about what the resource is about and what the 'takeaway' message is for our purposes
 * Links to go in the pad — http://pad.pirateparty.org.au/p/AgricultureWG

Frequency of meetings

 * Next meeting to be in about a fortnight, pending resources.

Action items

 * Read and research, compile links in pad (link to pad above)