Rain gives SA farmers confidence boost as they head into new year

The tide may be changing for farmer confidence in South Australia, indicating a potential move towards a more positive 2024 for the sector.

The latest Rabobank Rural Confidence Survey showed an improved outlook reported by primary producers in New South Wales, Queensland, and in South Australia — which had the highest jump in confidence.

Of South Australian farmers surveyed, only 45 per cent expect the agricultural economy to worsen, down from 50 per cent last quarter, with 15 per cent expecting improvement in the next 12 months.

While confidence levels in South Australia were still low overall, it was one of the most optimistic results in the country and may be a sign that sentiment is slowly shifting after a difficult year.

So why might some South Australian farmers be feeling more confident than farmers in other parts of the country?

Upward trend

Rabobank’s regional manager for SA, Roger Matthews, said the improvement in the results was mostly because of increased livestock prices and solid grain yields across the state.

“The survey was taken in late October and early November, and it was probably in almost late October period we actually started to see particularly livestock prices start to improve,” Mr Matthews said.

“There had been a fairly significant trend downwards until that point.”

Even though confidence has improved, the study still showed there were still a lot of worried farmers across the state.

“There are concerns around input prices, there are concerns around commodity prices, and also seasons,” Mr Matthews said.

“Those three are really the main three drivers of confidence.”

But the improvement may be a sign of a changing tide, according to Mr Matthews.

“2023 has been a tough year, 2024 in terms of confidence is probably looking a little bit better … it certainly looks as if the trend has turned and we’re on an upward trend at the moment,” he said.

Only way is up

The South East was the most positive region in the state, known for its reliable rainfall even in drier times.

Bool Lagoon prime lamb and red Angus cattle farmer Kerry DeGaris said this year had been a rollercoaster, but she was ending the year on a more positive note following the rain.

“Generally [I’m] pretty happy with the way things are tracking now,” she said.

“If you’d asked me before we had the rain in the last few weeks, I probably would have answered a bit differently.”

But overall, the year was one of the tougher ones due to low livestock prices.

For the first time, Ms DeGaris sold her lambs under contract, concerned about what prices may be like when it came time to sell.

“We had never needed to do that … we needed that assurity,” she said. 

“We were nervous, and we destocked.”

Ms DeGaris is hopeful livestock prices will continue to improve into the new year.

“They have to, because our cost of production isn’t going down so for us to stay viable prices need to return,” she said. 

Recent rain improves confidence

The survey results were taken before the recent high rainfalls observed across the state. While not good news for some, for many it was a welcome relief heading into drier times.

Ag technologist based at Paskeville on the Yorke Peninsula, Leighton Wilksch, said his weather stations observed up to 138 millimetres of rain in South Australia’s Mid North.

“That is significantly more than we would normally get in December,” he said.

“For a lot of areas, they have received a similar amount of rainfall in the last week or so compared to what they did in the whole of winter.

“That gives people confidence to know that they have got moisture available to grow those crops.”

Mr Matthews said the recent rain would be assuring farmers the year ahead may be better than expected.

He anticipates even higher levels of confidence in the next quarterly survey.

“They’ll go into the 2024 cropping season with a pretty good soil moisture profile, which is a little bit more optimistic than where it’s been,” he said.