Hello.
I would like to let you all know about a petition you can sign if you would like to see the supermarkets show more support to 100% Australian made and owned companies.

I believe the current situation is out of control with foreign owned and made products having enormous market power.

As an Australian i think its our right to have a fair share of 100% Australian made and owned products because if we don't support our own nobody else will.

We need a fair balance not the current 90% foreign 10% Australian ratio.

People who are interested in showing their support for Australian products are welcome to sign the petition and show the supermarkets that Australians still want to support our own industries.

Thank you


http://www.gopetition.com/petition/41252.html

*We need a fair balance not the current 90% foreign 10% Australian ratio*

Well that is certainly not the case with Australian grown and
manufactured. Supermarkets generally stock both, consumers vote
with their wallets every day.

As to Australians owning food manufacturers etc, it is commonly
super funds (owned by Australian workers) who have flogged off many
food manufacturers to offshore interests, for a quick buck.

That is their choice, but it makes no sense to now complain that
many of these companies are no longer Australian owned.

By attacking supermarkets, you are simply shooting the messenger,
for they carry what customers are prepared to spend money on.

AussieFarmer:

I've happily signed your petition. It's the least I could do. I fully support Australian products in our Supermarkets, fully support our
Aussie Farmers, who are doing it tough, and I fully support Aussie jobs first and foremost!

May I please ask a couple of naive questions?

If it is true that Australian farmers only provide 10% of the country's food needs...

>>We need a fair balance not the current 90% foreign 10% Australian ratio<<

...does this not mean that in order to achieve 100% self-sufficiency, farm output will need to increase tenfold?

Is this physically possible? How will it be achieved?

Or is a "fair balance" perhaps 50%? That's a mere fivefold increase. How can that be achieved?

Or maybe 20% is deemed to be "fair"? By whom? Why 20%? Why would 20% be fair, when 10% is manifestly unfair?

And - just as an afterthought - what will (pick any of the above) do to our cost-of-living?

Or is this all just another round of sloganeering, in its most basic, mindless form?

Because if any such campaign is going to get any traction at all, it will need answers to these, and a host of other more difficult questions. Simply appealing to the lowest common denominator and hoping that no-one will notice the lack of substance is not going to hack it.

It is actually one of the downsides of the web, that it is oh-so-easy to publish, absolutely anything. Regrettably, many seem to take this as licence to scribble on it as they please.

Which gives us stuff like this, with all the intellectual content of graffiti.

*If it is true that Australian farmers only provide 10% of the country's food needs...*

Well no Pericles, its not true, basically intellectual dribble.

Australia still produces far more food then it consumes and
agriculture remains a major exporter. But we export alot
of boatloads of primary products, commonly before they are
turned into high value packages, ready for the shop shelf.

What is true is that alot of local food processing is undertaken
by a handful of global food processors, like Unilever, Kraft,
Nestle, Simplot and Fonterra.

Birds Eye, Vegemite, Pura, etc, have over the years been flogged
off to these companies. But they still process here and use local
ingredients for much of what they produce.

Many of our meatworks have now been sold to the Brazilians. It seems
they are much better at running them and marketing that meat,
then we ever were.

We import alot of niche speciality food products, as anyone can
see in the supermarket isles. They give consumers choice, which is
not a bad thing.

But Australian farmers remain export focussed on the whole, for
that is where most of our production goes.

What we need is more local intelligent food processors like Carmans.
If a Melbourne housewife can be competitive at Coles and Woolies,
so could some others.

I'm over paying $5.99 - $9.99per kilo for a few odd tomatoes, apples, mandarines, (peaches nectarines plums when in season) or oranges which are rotten inside from weeks or months of freezing from 'the fresh food' people or paying $5.99 - $9.99 per kilo from Colds where the meat appears and smells rank.

Choice! Hurray finally! Congratulations farmers, many towns and smaller cities need fresher fruit & veg at realistic prices found in more markets!