A NEW report from ABARES which indicates little change in the level of foreign ownership of Australian farm land since the 1980s has been described as a "whitewash" by Shadow Agriculture and Food Security Minister, John Cobb.
He said the report had glossed over the issues needing forensic examination and had failed to shed new light on who owns what in our own "backyard".
"The public expected some hard-nosed investigation but instead all we have is some flimsy rehashed data that we could have got from picking up any newspaper.
"The only thing this confirms is the Labor government hasn't got a clue and its 100 per cent capital city-based Cabinet is plainly out-of-touch with what is happening in regional Australia. This is an attempt to pretend the issue does not exist and that there’s nothing to see here – so move along.
"We need real data about the levels of foreign ownership of farm land and agribusiness so the government can monitor foreign buy-outs and adjust policy settings when foreign control is not in Australia’s national interests.
"This is not ABARES' fault. The government hasn't given this study the scope required to fully assess the situation, instead it is reinforcing the useless information provided by the ABS survey carried out last year.
"The ABS survey didn't even look at the value of production under foreign control or the nationality of foreign landholders, so provides even less information than 1983-84 data almost 30 years ago.
"The ABARES report states on page 1 that the "information is extremely limited"… we didn’t need an expensive government report to tell us that.
"The Coalition remains deeply concerned about this issue and we will announce our policy in coming months.
"It is obvious that the $231 million trigger before the Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB) weighs in is clearly out of step with reality, and that the disparity between the trigger for urban versus regional purchases is nonsensical."
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