Australia’s Disappearing Middle

Australia might be known as the sunburnt country, but for most of us that usually just means getting sunburnt at the beach. More than 80% of Australians live in urban areas within 50 kilometres of the coastline, and most of those urban areas are our capital cities.

This a far cry from the situation at the beginning of last century, when “the bush” was seen to be the heart of Australia, and the economic prosperity of the agriculture industry earned farmers, or “cockies”, a prominent place in the iconic Aussie identity.

These days, that romanticism for the land usually manifests itself as credit card purchases made by tourists who want the Akubra and the Drizabone look without leaving the footpaths of George Street. And as for the ‘real’ Australians, well, the bush just isn’t sexy anymore.

But with Australia’s current election uncertainty, three independents from rural areas, Tony Windsor, Bob Katter and Rob Oakshott, are set to have a much bigger influence on the nation’s next three years than anyone could have expected. All of a sudden, urban Australia might need to hear about the issues facing rural and regional areas.

Over the Great Dividing Range

Richard Waterhouse, Bicentennial Professor of Australian History at the University of Sydney, says that continual urbanisation has created the existing gap between the city and country, and many Australians simply don’t have any connection to the land anymore.

“I think there’s a complete dysfunction between rural and urban Australia, and frankly I don’t think people in urban Australia now give a damn about rural Australia,” Professor Waterhouse says.

While it may be the case that urban Australians are less connected to country areas than they were in the past, farmers are facing increasingly difficult circumstances in which to sell their produce, and many are being forced to reconsider their farming lifestyle altogether.

It might seem insignificant, but the changing face of rural Australia has important social and environmental consequences for everyone, including those of us in urban areas. But it’s a change that’s gone largely unnoticed, except by the farmers who are struggling to survive amidst droughts, poor terms of trade, and increasing costs.

The Cost of Cattle

Rob Etheridge is a grazier from Barraba, a tiny country town in the north west of NSW with a population of just over 1000. Barraba is in the New England electorate represented by Tony Windsor, one of the independents holding power in Australia’s hung parliament.

Rob owns a commercial cattle property, where he lives with his wife Gwendolyn and two children. Today, he is grinning because it has rained for the first time in months. The area usually receives 750 millimetres of rain annually, but until yesterday, they’d only received 350 millimetres for the year.

But Rob says that his biggest concern is not water, it’s the prices he’s been getting for his cattle.

“Cattle prices are 20% lower, maybe even 25% lower, than what we were getting in real terms 20 years ago. Think of the price of everyday things that you consume and how that price has gone up [over 20 years]. And therein lies our problem, our terms of trade have just been eroded so much.”

Neil Argent, Associate Professor in Geography and Planning from the University of New England, says that the free trade conditions that have created this situation aren’t going to change any time soon. Australian agriculture is unique among Western developed countries because the government does not provide subsidies to help farmers with their costs, like they do in the European Union and America, making it harder still for Australian farmers to compete.

Rob followed in his father’s footsteps to run the family property and has been on the land since he left high school. In the last eight years, Rob has bought land in other parts of Australia to provide income for the farm during difficult times.

Associate Professor Argent says that more farmers are being forced to rely on alternate sources of income in order to remain viable.

“We know that the vast majority of farmers, to a greater or lesser extent, rely on off-farm income, whether that be work that they do themselves or some other enterprise that they’ve got or started up on the side somewhere.”

But ensuring access to off-farm income is not always easy and this is one of the reasons that smaller family farms have steadily declined, and the owners have gone to join the rest of Australia on the coast.

The Disappearing Middle

The traditional image of the small family farm still dominates the way that we imagine rural Australia, thanks to films like Gallipoli and poets like Lawson and Paterson. But in today’s economic conditions, it is more efficient for farms to be run at a very large scale. As commercial farms get bigger in order to survive, there has also been a growth in hobby farms around urban centres.

Associate Professor Argent describes this as the ‘disappearing middle hypothesis’ and says that while research is still confirming this trend, it seems to explain the changes that have been occurring in rural Australia.

“There’s a growth in the hobby farmer end of the market and then at the other end there’s this growth in the corporate-style or really large family operations. And then the traditional family farm in the middle is being squeezed out.”

Bevan and Jo Benson own another cattle farm near the town of Barraba. The property previously belonged to Bevan’s parents, and he spent most of his childhood there. Bevan and Jo also raised their three children on that same block of land.

Bevan admits that family-run farms like his, with no outside income, will probably get pushed out of the market. He says that this is because the price of land has increased while the monetary returns from selling cattle haven’t. If their children wanted to come back to live on the farm as adults, the family would need more space.

“There’s no way in the world a property can pay for itself back again [now]. It might pay the interest but it can’t pay the credit back.”

The Farmer Wants a Life

Despite the financial difficulties pushing the traditional family farm out of the Australian agricultural scene, the lifestyle remains the main reason many endure the hardships and stay.

Bevan couldn’t imagine being anything other than a farmer and for him the benefits of the farming lifestyle are all about finding enjoyment in his work.

“If you can get job satisfaction, whichever way it is, that’s what matters. It’s about finding a job that isn’t work. If you wake up every day and you hate going there, you’ve got to find something new, irrespective of salary.”

For Rob, the farming lifestyle is about raising his children on the land and having the job flexibility that allows him to spend time with them.

“Your family farm is a great place to bring up children. Other children only see their mum and dad when they leave for school, and I’ve made a big point, because I can, of running my kids out to the [school] bus whenever it’s possible.”

But Rob thinks it’s a lifestyle that won’t continue if the smaller family farms continue to be replaced by larger ones.  Even though he loves the land, he doesn’t think he’ll be able to stay there forever.

“I think there’s been a gradual shift in my generation from people who love their sheep and love their cattle to the realisation that it’s not all beer and skittles. It is a lifestyle thing, but at the end of the day you’ve got to look at the bottom line.”

Farming, as urban Australians like to imagine it in movies and books, faces an uncertain future. As commercial farms get bigger in order to survive, those iconic small rural communities that once characterised Australia will disappear.

“The bigger players come in and buy up land … and they’re probably only going to be here for a short time. I think we certainly are losing that sense of community,” says Rob.

Why Does It Matter?

In the city, it’s easy not to care.

But Associate Professor Argent says that all Australians have a vested interest in what happens to Australian agriculture.

“There is an ongoing concern for preservation of people on the land, which is basically a food security issue. Australia’s population is growing at an amazingly rapid rate for a Western developed nation. Issues over carrying capacity and food security, they’re not going to go away.”

While Australia certainly isn’t riding on the sheep’s (or the cow’s) back anymore, farmers still produce 93% of Australia’s domestic food supply. The changes affecting farmers affect us all.

Australia’s middle isn’t empty after all. Well, not yet.