Charles Burke
AgForce CEO

The appearance and good news stories of rain across many section of regional Queensland in recent weeks has been welcomed.

Many AgForce members were seeing out the last hours of a two-day conference in Cloncurry when the heavens opened. Some were held up getting home with roads blocked through Longreach and Barcaldine. From all reports, none were too worried.

However for every story of good rain, there is a story of someone missing out. Even for those areas that received some rain the drought is still a long way from being over.

And that's a point that need to continue to be made to those living in urban areas, along the east coast of Queensland.

It's worth noting that the media coverage of the drought has been excellent over a long period.

We continue to rely heavily on regional media, including QCL and ABC, which continue to do an excellent job despite limited resources.

However I would like to thank the many major metropolitan outlets who have made the effort to travel to regional Queensland and hear firsthand to the stories of those battling drought.

Many media outlets have been to Longreach, Winton and Barcaldine. In particularly the Sunday Mail with their excellent forum, backed up by their and fundraising efforts. They were followed by Channel 7 and 9, both of which covered the drought in a real and human way.

More recently AgForce members have been working with Channel 10, Win and ABC's AM program to stretch the coverage to other parts of Queensland, particularly the north-west and south-west of the state.

Last weekend dozens of locals in Quilpie turned out to welcome a news crew and take the chance to continue to push their case for inclusion on the Federal Government's drought register, and enjoy an impromptu social gathering.

Now is not the time to stop telling the stories, just because there has been some early season rain in some parts of Queensland.

For those who did receive some rain, the green shoots will now battle with the roos, but follow up rain may mean it is time to look to the future and how to finance restocking.

There are many ways to measure the drought, but here's a statistic worth considering.

Between 2002 and 2003, decreases in agricultural production due to drought resulted in a one per cent reduction in the nations GDP. This is a significant hit to the Australian economy, considering that the global financial crisis caused a reduction of two per cent of Australia's GDP.

Starting next week, AgForce will use a combination of video clips and information gathered in recent months to continue to promote the impacts of drought on those affected.

This social media showcase will show the very real effects of drought that are not just financial, but often less-obvious ones which have longer-term ramifications.

This article ran in the Queensland Country Life on November 12.

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