Belly, food has always been a product that can be substituted for a cheaper brand, or, an alternative product.
when bananas hit $12 per kilo, as you suggest, the volume sold is a mere fraction of usual volumes, mainly because the consume finds an alternative.

When farm hand wages hit the $45 per hour mark, S will hit the fan, as consumers will be buying far more cheaper imports.

The fact of the matter is, that unless there is a huge change to the costs of farming here, including consumables and wages, we can never become competitive supplier on the global market.

In fact, our beef industries days are numbered, as the likes of Argintina and Brazil are going to take a lot of our market.

Our heard is about 20 million, these two have about ten times that and are much closer to the customer.

As I have suggested before, we are kidding ourselves.

You will pay for quality, Pilbara is the richest iron ore body ever found.
Innovation is the tool for farming. There is not much hope of wages being diluted, you would not get any labour at all. So you will have to cope with that.
You can't have miners on mega bucks and farm hands on pittance.
The US wage structure is different from AU. To hard to compare.
The dressing rate for sheep is 80 / butcher / day. The dressing rate for cattle is 16 up to 600 kg / butcher / day and anything over 600 kg is 2 for one

*So you will have to cope with that.*

Well yes 579, just don't invest in farming, invest your money
elsewhere. So your magic food producers for the world, won't happen.

Farming is already extremely innovative. But if workers are making
a fortune and farmers are doing dough, then you have exactly what
we have now, young people telling their parents to stick the farm,
they are off to the mines or the city.

You want workers to have every cushy benefit imaginable, but farmers
are meant to keep investing to create your food production nirvana,
where everyone benefits, except the farmer. It ain't gonna happen.

What is happening right now is that farmers are mortgaged to the
roof and banks won't let them increase borrowings, unless they can
show that it will be profitable. In alot of cases they can't,
so they won't be lent the money.

The numbers have to stack up, 579. If I told you that you that there
was work for you, but you'd only get paid in years where the weather
was ok and I'd pay you less then other workers, you might not want
the job. Alot of farmers are only there, to try and preserve what
they have after a lifetimes work, which is commonly a whole lot
of debt, with nobody but foreigners wanting to buy the land. So
more and more of it will be sold to the Chinese and the Arabs. Let
them wear the losses, when they twig as to how the system works

Lexi,
You said, "The UN estimates that production will need to increase by
70 per cent by 2050 in order to meet the world population need".

That being correct, I want to know how we are to improve production to become a super food power? Expect R & D to do the job? NO way!
We are utilizing very nearly all the productive land in Aus right now. Drive around western parts and see the crops now grown on very marginal land. Road trip to WA will surprize in just how far west crops are grown, cross the Nullabor, and how far East the WA farmers crop. Am informed these farmers get a good crop once every 9 years. Big gamble for them and shows the extent of marginal farming now. Continued urban expansion is covering much of good productive land.

The world needs action now to reduce the population or millions more will starve. Where is the extra production to come from and at what price. If the climate alarmists are right maybe Russia and Canada will be able to open up more land for farming, that is now frozen. Care to bet on that anyone? Do not forget the oceans fish stocks are being depleted as well.

Future does not look good for many.

Butch and Yabby,
Good luck with educating 579, it is a lost cause, There are none so blind as those that will not see.

I've got a few acres. I looked at how little people doing useful things, like growing food, were making. You'd have to be an idiot.

If you want a decent return you have to do something totally useless, like I did.

I grew advanced shrubs, & a a few other pretties for the building industry wanting instant gardens in their developments, charged silly prices, because they were the best, & made a small quid. Certainly no fortune, but better than those fools growing food.

I don't think hobby farmers were made to make money.
Try growing baked beans, spaghetti, or loaves of bread.
When you simply give up and say this or that won't work, it's time to get out of the way.