This week, Dairy Committee Member Rob Miller and I have done interviews with media outlets in the UK, China, Hong Kong, New Zealand and the US about the impact on agriculture.
The influence of people like Chris Hemsworth and Russell Crowe has helped draw this attention, but it's the sheer scale of these fires that has really grabbed the interest of journalists.
Almost 5 million hectares or six per cent of NSW have been burned, an area larger than the Netherlands. Nationally, the estimates are up to 13m hectares - more than 10 times the size of the Amazon fires and California fires in 2018.
The impact on agriculture is starting to emerge as assessment teams from the Department of Primary Industries and Local Land Services enter fire grounds. The livestock losses will be significant, as will be the impact on apiarists with hives lost and the ferocity of these fires destroying pollen supplies for years to come.
We must also be mindful of our horticultural producers, with crops and infrastructure damage in the Batlow, Bilpin and North Coast regions. Oyster farmers are also not immune, with some damage to sheds and water quality issues due to ash.
Dairy producers on the South Coast have had a pressing need for immediate support and the DPI and LLS have done a good job in getting emergency fodder, generators and fuel onto dairy farms.
As always, farmers are helping their fellow farmers with fodder donations and community organisations are doing all they can to support everyone. But farmers do require immediate and ongoing assistance to keep livestock alive with water and feed.
Our main focus is to work closely with the DPI and LLS to ensure farmers get the ongoing assistance they need and to put together a list of priorities for the agriculture sector for the $2 billion National Bushfire Recovery Fund.
- JAMES JACKSON, NSW Farmers president
