A COALITION government would come under pressure to revive the single desk for wheat exports, thwarting the emergence of new exporters and the expansion in Australia of multinational grain merchants.
NSW Farmers Association grains committee chairman Mark Hoskinson said a $1.2 billion bid by Canadian company Agrium for former monopoly wheat exporter AWB underlined the need for a national wheat pool, The Australian Financial Review reports.
He said the Nationals had assured him that, if a Coalition government is elected on Saturday, it would work to establish a grower-owned collective to market Australian wheat.
"This is the foreign takeover of another grain company that was developed by farmers for farmers to benefit farmers," Mr Hoskinson said of Agrium's offer for AWB, which trumped an earlier offer from Australian company GrainCorp.
"Let's look at getting AWB back into the hands of growers."
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