High labour costs, increased grower expenses, low farmgate prices and alleged unfair supermarket pressures are some of the challenges farmers at the Lockyer Valley Growers 2024 Expo said are causing them sleepless nights.
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In between studying trial plots of new seed varieties and speaking with suppliers, the main topics of conversation for growers when catching up with other farmers at the Gatton venue after the weather, inevitably turned to increased on-farm costs and unsatisfactory farm gate prices.
While no growers would go on the record regarding the mega-supermarkets for fear of retribution, many still declined to comment if their name accompanied an unrelated area of concern.
At the expo a genuine anxiety of the "Colesworth reprisal" as one grower bleakly described it, was obvious, with many farmers not wanting to make any kind of statement.
This demonstrated the significant imbalance of market power which had made farmers fear losing their biggest customer, even if it is one which makes it harder every year for them to turn a profit.
"The farmgate price of some vegetables has not increased for growers for a long time, in some cases years," one said.
"Although the prices keep going up at the supermarkets, the cost of living troubles so many families have comes from this."
"Everything is going up, diesel, fertilisers, seeds and workers costs," a grower said.
"Everything except the farm gate price."
Another said they were under pressure to grow "perfect" produce
"There's too much waste when they insist on perfect looking produce," a grower said.
His mate who farmed nearby agreed.
"It tastes good but they are keeping prices up unfairly while we lose out," the grower said.
Other said they were very worried about getting fair prices for what they said was "bloody hard work."
However, a few farmers were happy to speak about other uncontrollable external variables which they said had impacted their agribusinesses.
Gurpreet Singh who travelled from South Australia to the LVG Expo, said punitive weather conditions had impacted his farm.
Mr Singh said the hotter daytime temperatures had been a concern.
"The harsh weather has been much hotter and drier than those experienced by Queensland growers," he said.
"And it gets a lot colder too."
Growers Sharee and Troy Parchert who along with sons, Brady, Callum, Brock and Zac also attended the LVG Expo, said high staff costs were always on their mind when planning their family's farm schedule.
"High labour costs are one of our biggest concerns," Mr Prchert said.
"There's a high price to pay for unskilled labour which is a worry."
For grower David Haak, who attended the expo with daughter Jennifer and son Cameron, experiencing lots of rain after initially preparing for the drier summer weather earlier predicted had been a challenge.
But one Queensland grower who asked not to be named, said too often the professional relationships with the "middlemen" who operated as the go-betweens with his business and his retail clients were not ideal.
He said would like to have better communication and experience greater transparency from fruit and vegetable brokers.
LVG president Michael Sippel said he believed farmers faced three major concerns at the moment.
"The first is the increasing cost of labour, particularly unskilled labour," he said.
"Secondly it is increasing input costs such as electricity and freight in particular."
"And thirdly, constant over-production in this country and export markets have declined since Covid."
Tell us your biggest on-farm challenges - Contact Alison Paterson on 0437 861 082.
