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Family Farmingaustraliawe oFten hear about land grabbing in developing countries, but australia’s abundance oF agricultural land has also made it a prime targetland matters bess mucKeIn 1999, Slow Food members Derice and Ross McDonald followed their dreams of living a sustainable rural life, and moved their family from Sydney to the nearby Hunter Valley. Over the past decade they have established a suc- cessful biodynamic farm, a 15-hectare vineyard coupled with fruit trees, veg- etable crops and beef cattle. However, they are now concerned that their way of life could be shattered by the incur- sion of Coal Seam Gas (CSG) mining, part of a new wave of large-scale land acquisitions.the battle for SoilThe family lives and works on prime agricultural land. As with many such regions of eastern Australia, the ter- rains best suited to agriculture are also where the underground coal seams are found. In recent years, the mining industry has gained increasing access for CSG exploration in the region. Wit- nessing this development, the couple has rallied together with other farmers and communities who are concerned about the future availability of clean water and land.“Consistent with Slow Food’s mis- sion we, along with many others, are mounting a challenge for the govern- ment to legislate against this intrusion on farming land,” say Derice and Ross. “Without the availability of this untaint- ed land, Australia will become a net importer of food which in the long term will support the degradation of locally produced nutritious food.”A step in the right direction came in January 2014 when the state govern- ment extended CSG exclusion zones to viticulture clusters in the Hunter region. However, concerns about the ‘gaps’ between these zones and for other re- gions were confirmed just two months later when farmers in the state’s north west received the devastating news that groundwater had been poisoned with uranium as a result of CSG activities. The Australian public has become in- creasingly aware of the infringements on farming land posed by CSG, how- ever other land grabs are yet to register a blip on the national psyche. Accord- ing to the Australian Bureau of Agricul- ture and Resource Economics, mining firms are just one of three main groups of foreign buyers snapping up Austra- lian farmland. Vast tracks of crop and pastoral lands are being sold to foreign agribusiness companies looking to secure food for export, and to foreign investment and pension funds in direct farmland acquisitions.“At this moment transnational compa- nies are intending to purchase some28 almanaCFind out moreLand grabbing is taking place, often legally, all over the world. Keys areas affected are Africa, Latin America, Asia, Oceania and Eastern Europe. In 2010, Slow Food launched a global campaign to stop land grabbing.