THE National Farmers Federation is "out of touch" and not listening to its core constituents, according to Nationals Senate leader, Barnaby Joyce.
Senator Joyce has attacked the Canberra-based farm lobby for supporting the Coalition's amendments to the Government's Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme instead of rejecting the legislation altogether.
The NFF has long argued for the exclusion of agriculture from the scheme, but allow incentives for farmers to generate offsets and sell carbon credits.
This was one of the Coalition's core amendments put to Minister for Climate Change, Penny Wong, yesterday.
On many occasions NFF president, David Crombie, has argued the case for farmers to be part of a carbon solution, conceding the debate on emissions trading globally had moved past whether climate change was real or not, and acknowledging there was a mood both in Australia and the world for something to be done about greenhouse pollution.
But Senator Joyce has not only slammed NFF's position, but branded it "out of touch".
"It's very disappointing to wake up and find a group that says they represent farmers supporting an emissions trading scheme," Senator Joyce said.
"We, for the life of us, can't find a farmer that supports the ETS.
"Where this inspiration came for the NFF to now decide that the ETS is the way to go is a very dangerous outcome.
"If the NFF says they believe in an ETS, then they must be philosophically at ease that is an appropriate tax for the Australian community…
"The core issue here is farmers don't support an emissions trading scheme and I think the National Farmers' Federation should start talking to farmers about what they think about an ETS."
Senator Joyce said he didn't think NFF was representing their core constituency on this issue.
"I'll be more blunt from that. The last time I got advice from the National Farmers' Federation about a piece of legislation they were imploring to support the sale of Telstra.
"I don't know how farmers would feel about that."
Senator Joyce said The Nationals were supporting amendments to exclude agriculture from the ETS, but NFF wanted more than that, calling for his party to vote for the scheme.
"They have now endorsed this overhead cost for all the inputs. Agriculture might be exempt but they haven't exempted all the other costs that are part of it," Senator Joyce said.
"I would say to the NFF that if you decide to let the snake into the house don't think that it's just going to stay in the kitchen."
NFF chief executive officer, Ben Fargher, said The Nationals were correct that there was frustration and anger in farming communities about the ETS, but that was why his group was fighting for changes.
"We're not out there saying we want an ETS," Mr Fargher said.
"But if we're going to have one, we're telling the Government and the Opposition the current one is flawed and we want it changed.
"We're saying if there is to be an emissions trading scheme, and the political reality is both sides have committed to some sort of scheme, then we want the direct emissions of agriculture excluded, we want credits to recognise the good environmental work farmers are doing and we want processor costs excluded because they would flow back to farmers.
"And we think that argument is too strong to be ignored."
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