THE NSW Farmers Association has welcomed the Federal Government’s announcement of an Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) inquiry into the supermarket retail sector.

The inquiry announcement followed last week’s recall of Federal Labor MPs to Canberra for urgent cost of living talks.

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NSW Farmers Association President Xavier Martin said North Coast farmers and those further afield were bearing the brunt of anti-competitive behaviour by “supply chain middle men”.

He said there was “long-running dysfunction between what the consumer pays and what the farmer is paid”.

“We’ve got members across NSW, and no doubt there are farmers across Australia, who have had the experience of seeing their produce on the shelf or at the checkout for three, five or ten times what they’re being paid for the actual goods from the farm,” Mr Martin said.

“With grocery costs surging, consumers and their families are struggling to put food on the table – yet farmers are still receiving the same dysfunctional prices for their produce as they did when input costs were far lower.

“It has become increasingly clear that margins are not being passed through the supply chain in a fair and equitable manner, and it is farmers and families who are footing the bill.”

He said the prices farmers received often did not cover their cost of production, with little justification and a ‘take it or leave it’ attitude from the supermarkets.

Individual farmers were afraid to speak out and risk losing supply contracts altogether.

“It’s about fairness,” Mr Martin said.

“There’s a high level of dysfunction and market signals are not delivering fair pricing to the farmers or to the consumers, so we’ve got a problem.

“This is going to be a really important opportunity for the ACCC to use their teeth and get to the bottom of why so many more farmers and their families are going out of business.”

He said it was important the Government was prepared to act on the inquiry recommendations, including “breaking up monopolies that don’t adhere to regulations”.

“Decades of nonsense around voluntary codes that clearly don’t work is not sufficient,” Mr Martin said.

“There are going to have to be mandated laws and rules put in place.

“If they keep gouging billions of dollars out of the supply chain and not playing by the rules, then as a modern nation we’ve got to be prepared to regulate them and break them up.”

The ACCC expects to publish an issues paper in February seeking views on the key issues it will consider in the inquiry.

An interim report will be provided to the Australian Government later this year, with the final report due early next year.

By Mike HELY