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HE the Hon Kim Beazley, AC
Ambassador of Australia to the United States
Remarks at Reception marking the Australian Year of the Farmer
Embassy of Australia, Washington DC
23 January 2012

Well thank you very much Chris and can I also join you in welcoming everybody to the Embassy here. I love these occasions in which we have the chance to express our appreciation of the American community with whom we relate and who treat us in such a hospitable and friendly fashion.

Chris, like myself, is a West Australian and we go back a long way in Western Australia. And if you go back a long way in Western Australia, you will have rural connections because before the mines took over we were essentially, and most of Australia was a nation, as the old saying used to be, that “rode on a sheep’s back.’ You can say ‘rode on a sheep’s back,’ but between the sheep and yourself was a bag of wheat as a saddle. And that’s what we were known for. That’s what was our identification as a people and we identified with the characters that rural Australia produced.

I must say, it’s always great to hear Cameron here and thank you again for regaling us with a much older form of music that reverberates through Australia. But there’s a particular significance here, because one of the things that’s happened since Native Title was recognised by the High Court in the early (19)90’s is huge tracts of land in Australia have been subject to successful Native Title claims. And one of the things which is happening on that land is more and more of the Aboriginal community are engaged in the pastoral industry. And now, in Western Australia at least, they’re quite a big sector, native Australian owners are quite a big sector of Australian agriculture. I don’t need to go into the history of that but there’s an awful lot of irony in it.

When I was a kid my first job was, as I wanted to own a bike and my parents said they would not buy it for me, I had to go and work to earn it so they sent me out to work on a farm for one summer. It was a terrific experience. Americans and Australians will find this unbelievable but I’m old enough for it to be the case that in those days you bagged seed wheat. So that meant that you had to put them in these hessian bags, put the seed wheat after it was it was pickled in the hessian bags, and throw them seed bags high, in about 120 degree heat, into the sheds where they were stored. And did I ever lose some weight.

But in those days there were workers on the farms. So on this particular farm, which would have been I suppose about six or seven thousand hectares, there were two full time workers and me, apart from the farmer and his family. And so we had enough around the district to make up a cricket team. One night there was a storm and lightening struck one of the paddocks and it caught on fire. We all got tipped out of bed, given hessian bags and told beat the fire out, which was the only mechanism we had available to fight the fire at that point. Thankfully it hadn’t taken hold so comprehensively that it wasn’t sufficient. That, and shoveling sand on it, that was it, we did survive it. So I survived that early rural experience – just – and got a whole respect for farmers out of it.

We actually have a good relationship between Australia and the United States in the rural areas. I know we are concerned always about subsidies here, and most of what you’ll hear from Chris and Kelly and people from Austrade is when we look at the American budgetary situation, the question is, are the subsidies dead yet. And that has a certain sort of resonance in Australian politics back home. But what has amazed me since I’ve been Ambassador here is how little that argument impacts on the relationship between Australian and American farmers, or aggies to make it more broader than simply farmers, there is an extraordinarily good relationship.

As I’ve had occasion to know, and I’ve met a few you at those occasions, having seen at meals and visits from the farmers’ federation presidents of Australia here, an enormous number of those who head up peak organisations here, in this town and the United States, coming in, exchanging ideas, exchanging views of the world and when we start to look across the globe there’s a lot of commonality of interest.

We and you can be proud of the fact that we feed the world, and proud of the fact that what we do on our rural properties is going to become more, not less, important to the rest of the globe and demand of us greater and greater efficiencies. The pressure for efficiencies now in our show is survival. But when you think about how important rural industries to Australia are and still are, there’s only a hundred and thirty thousand Australian farmers. It’s barely enough to make up two House of Representatives constituencies. That’s a sign of how things have gone.

The pressure, the costs pressures on farmers have made them unbelievably efficient. They are also the best educated small businesses in Australia, without doubt the most tech savvy with an absolutely encyclopedic knowledge of the properties that they are dealing with, and clever, very clever in the way they handle themselves - great survivors.

We are constantly hit with drought. We farm land that shouldn’t be farmed in many circumstances. It can be farmed basically because of the nutrients that we put into it, but also the cleverness with which it is handled and the toughness and resilience of Australian farmers. Saved often by their wives, many of whom are nurses or school teachers in the towns where those properties operate, and for a very considerable period of time they are the only income in the household as they struggle with the consequences of drought or flood – one or the other.

But then of course there are good years and the good years are very profitable indeed and one of the countries that make the good years very profitable is the United States. You are our third largest export market for agricultural product. Our key agricultural exports to you are beef, wine and lamb. And the US is our third largest two-way trading partner. And as well as trading with each other, Australia and the US work closely together in international forums, such at the G20 and APEC which promote productivity improvements and food security throughout the world.

So these are industries which are worth celebrating. This is a lifestyle and a contribution that is worth acknowledging by a year to recognise what it is that our farmers do. And I hope that out of this year back in Australia there’ll be an even greater appreciation in our community more broadly, of what it is that the farmers produce for all of us.

You can moan and groan a bit about whether or not people are properly appreciated. Actually, Australian farmers and rural producers are in fact quite well appreciated in Australia. They do secure the sympathy, empathy and support of the Australian people and when there is trouble there is always a rush to be supportive of our farmers. But at the end of the day, beyond the ability to function through shocking climate conditions, there is very, very little that Australian farmers demand of the community.

The spirit in Australia, the spirit of our farming and bush communities, the idea of independence, the idea of resilience, the idea of taking responsibilities for your mates in times of trouble, these were things which we liked to assume were part of the Australian national character. And they were part of what was very self-consciously described as a bush ethos. So, it’s a good year for us. It’s kind of you by being here present to celebrate it with us.

The linkages between us are very great. The sympathy and empathy between farmers in the US and between agriculturals in the US and Australia is very great and I’m very pleased to have had this chance again to welcome all of you here.

[Ends]