FAR levy payers have declared their support for continued investment in research and extension for their industry.
The final referendum votes are in and the results are clear… cropping farmers strongly support continued investment in research and extension for their industry. At 12 o’clock today, the Foundation for Arable Research (FAR) received the ‘declaration of result’ following its sixth referendum of growers, which has determined significant support for the levy funded organisation. FAR will now make an application to the Minister for these levy orders to be put in place. Electionz.com Ltd were contracted to administer the referendum which, over the past month, has given arable, maize and cereal silage growers the opportunity to have their say on whether or not they wish to continue investing in industry good research through FAR. The FAR referendum covers three separate levy orders, and support for each of them is equal to the strong result achieved in the 2011 referendum. The voter return percentage was 31.2% of eligible voters. Results were: Arable crops, 88% support by number of votes and 87% by production area; Maize, 79% support by number of votes and 74% by production area, and Cereal silage, 69% support by number of votes and 66% by production area. Alison Stewart, FAR’s Chief Executive says these results are a really pleasing endorsement of the hard work and commitment of growers, FAR staff and industry colleagues. “We work hard to develop research programmes that meet the needs of our growers. Through feedback from our regional Arable Research Groups and Research and Development Advisory Committee, we identify areas of importance, and develop a balanced portfolio of research projects that address both short and long term needs of the industry. “In the last six years, FAR has increased its overall revenue by leveraging growers levy money with other external funds and this has enabled us to deliver a much broader suite of R&D activities that includes biosecurity, agronomy, pest management, environmental research and the establishment of a new knowledge exchange platform called ‘Growers Leading Change’. This investment continues to safeguard the future of the arable industry by maintaining productivity and profitability with a lower environmental footprint and securing our social license to operate”. |