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Graziers forced off Mount Morris Station near Charleville – carbon farming is part of the financial issue

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Last May I tried to get a grip on the circumstances at Mount Morris Station – News from the world of carbon farming – Charleville property sold up by bank despite carbon farming project.
A reader has just sent this link from the Chronicle in Toowoomba last October – Stuart family forced off Mount Morris – but not a word mentioned about carbon farming. The 20th May 2014 article in The Australian quotes the bank with their reservations about the very long term nature of the carbon farming agreements. But there must be more than that concerning the bank. Income is income – so what if it runs for a very long time – why would a bank not like that?
If anybody has any further information please let us know.

7 thoughts on “Graziers forced off Mount Morris Station near Charleville – carbon farming is part of the financial issue”

  1. this is a fairly recent transcript on how or not existing carbon abatement schemes will adapt to Direct Action www.abc.net.au/news/2014-11-08/carbon-farming/5877656
    the Stuart family are still active through the Mount Morris facebook page m2.facebook.com/MountMorrisStation
    and it seems they’re setting up a fighting fund
    I’m not quite sure what the ‘fight’ is about – is the bank negligent for lending cash to a farmer on what the farmer later claims to be ‘carbon credit’ estimates
    and here is Jennifer Marohasy jennifermarohasy.com/2014/06/leaving-mt-morris-charleville-cate-stuart/

  2. this article is informative on why lenders are reluctant to fund carbon farming operations
    www.abc.net.au/news/2014-05-20/bank-views-carbon-farming-as-encumbrance/5465000
    carbon credit farming still permits grazing on the land
    cutting and pasting from the article “Agricultural consultant Terry McCosker says there are many other producers who share the Stuart family’s predicament.

    “Carbon farming is a great business strategy, it’s a good way of adding income, but banks everywhere…have really pulled up with 100 year permanence issues.”

    He explains banks are reluctant to support landholders under the current Carbon Farming Initiative because the 100-year rule can restrict future land use.

    Under the scheme, future buyers are obligated to continue carbon sequestration activities until the century-long agreement expires.

    The Coalition are yet to make good on a pre-election commitment to introduce a 25-year option that Mr McCosker says will pave the way for more farmers to sign up to the CFI.”

  3. Carbon Credits only have a value if someone (including the government) is willing to buy them. AGW (or Climate change as defined by the IPCC) is a scam. If at last governments realise it is a scam, stop subsidies and do away with CO2 emission targets then carbon credits will have no value.
    No one in business including farming should get subsidies. Like others, farmers need to be inventive. Did you see the Landline program about the farmers who installed robotic milking machines where the cows go to be milk three times a day at their own leisure with no human worker? The farmers could attend to the new bottling plant, cheese making and to tourists. They are clearly making money.

  5. When the world finally tires of the current CAGW/CO2 tomfoolery then the whole array of wigwams for goose’s bridles that go with it will become valueless overnight e.g. carbon credits, carbon offsets, LGCs (Large-scale Generation Certificates), STCs (Small-scale technology certificates), cap-and-trade, production tax credits, carbon sequestration etc etc…. But even without such a return to sanity the whole looney tunes brigade is just as likely to head off after some new mutation of their cult e.g:

    Researchers based at Princeton University report in the journal Nature Climate Change that the carbon in soil — which contains twice the amount of carbon in all plants and Earth’s atmosphere combined — could become increasingly volatile as people add more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, largely because of increased plant growth. The researchers developed the first computer model to show at a global scale the complex interaction between carbon, plants and soil, which includes numerous bacteria, fungi, minerals and carbon compounds that respond in complex ways to temperature, moisture and the carbon that plants contribute to soil.

    Tony Abbotts “direct action policy” by this time hopefully will have been allowed to whither and die due to lack of funding and lack of interest.

  6. My thoughts too Bob in Castlemaine.
    I made another comment but it seems it has disappeared into a black hole (maybe eaten by bacteria or fungus).
    I basically said that most of the ABC is biased, the paper shown in Val’s video is very labour intensive and it will not be a significant money spinner (I spent a vacation while at Uni in a paper mill which is now gone)

  7. A reader has sent this lengthy press article in –
    Drought, floods, heat … our famously tough farmers face many foes. But for many, dealing with banks has proved the greatest catastrophe of all.

    Stuart no longer lives at Mount Morris and she can’t speak of her morning ritual without emotion. The bank evicted the family last October and her heart is broken. “All I have is photographs now.”
    www.theage.com.au/good-weekend/farmers-in-crisis-as-the-banks-close-in-20150508-1mrh54.html

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