WAFarmers Dairy Conference: State Government shares vision of $187 million WA dairy industry

The State Government has doubled down on its support for the Western Australian Dairy Industry’s Five-Year Development Plan focused on future growth and sustainability of the $187 million sector.

Speaking at the WA Dairy Conference in Busselton last week, Agriculture Minister Jackie Jarvis acknowledged the ongoing efforts of the State’s dairy farmers who had built a reputation as reliable and premium quality milk producers.

She encouraged industry to continue its work in implementing the plan, launched last year by the WA Dairy Industry Working Group.

“The Cook Government supports the Plan, sharing industry’s vision for the WA dairy sector to thrive, grow, diversify, be innovative and sustainable for the benefit of future generations,” Ms Jarvis said.

“The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development is collaborating with Dairy Australia, Western Dairy and representatives of the WADIWG to support the success of the sector.

“Growth of the industry has the potential to diversify our State’s dairy offering further and develop new markets, but there are challenges to overcome including decarbonisation and global biosecurity threats.

“It is now time to adapt, decrease risk, increase resilience and be disruption ready, to be positioned to capture new opportunities.”

The Plan’s six major development goals cover profitability, supply chains, new markets, new products, succession planning and the industry’s carbon footprint.

The working group has engaged dairy industry experts Bluesee Consulting to implement the plan during the next three months.

Ms Jarvis said it was her fourth time attending the conference, in various capacities, and enjoyed meeting with “intergenerational dairy farmers that have built an excellent reputation of producing premium quality milk”.

“The WA dairy industry has about 116 dairy farms and in 2021-2022 contributed more than $187 million to the State’s economy,” she said.

She said while WA’s production was only four per cent of Australia’s total production, the State’s geographical isolation meant the industry was “incredibly important at ensuring we have a premium supply of local milk, given that we are so far away from anywhere else that produces fresh milk”.

“Moving forward our proximity to the South East Asian market makes us well positioned to capture new market opportunities in this region — it is important to remember that Asia has the fastest growing dairy consumption in the world,” Ms Jarvis said.

With those opportunities also comes threats to the sector — such as emergency animal diseases.

“These have the potential to have a significant impact on the WA dairy industry — particularly that we have a small number of farms, in close proximity and larger herd sizes (than in the eastern states),” she said.

“Foot and mouth disease and lumpy skin disease outbreaks in Indonesia obviously create an increased threat to WA livestock.

“As a result, the WA Government has increased prevention and preparedness to safeguard our industries with the allocation of $32.6 million in the 2023/24 State Budget to help protect the WA livestock industry from increasing threats.”

The additional funding was aimed at enhancing WA’s ability to respond to disease outbreaks if and when they come, by increasing field personnel, improving veterinary pathology, epidemiology and diagnostic capability, along side delivering emergency training and exercises.

The funding would establish 14 new full-time positions as the Government seeks to make the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development an “employer of choice for early career scientists and vets”.