A Reference Group headed by National Farmers Federation President, Peter Corish, was appointed by the government in March to develop a "comprehensive policy framework to build, secure and protect Australian agriculture".
The group has since released a position paper which promotes the concept of payments to farmers for environmental services such as biodiversity (for example, the management of wetlands for migratory bird habitats), improved air and water quality.
To be feasible, it said incomes from delivery of environmental services would need to at least offset any reductions in earnings from traditional agricultural enterprises that result from changed management practices.
Many landholders would no doubt be eager to provide environmental services for an agreed recurrent budgetary allocation that at least offsets any reduction in earning from growing cows or cotton.
This won't be straight forward.
There are simply too few tax payers relative to the many environmental services currently provided for free by landholders.
The position paper suggests payments for environmental services could be delivered through "market based instruments".
Functioning markets exist for sulphur dioxide credits in the US and for carbon dioxide in Europe. The theory is that a cap is placed on pollution emissions then permits equal to the cap are distributed to the polluters.
This type of approach requires transferable rights to be defined and protected by government.
Could this concept be used to develop markets in the sort of environment services demanded of farmers here?
Mick Keogh of the Australian Farm Institute has calculated that current bans on tree clearing in Australia are potentially worth $600 million a year in carbon dioxide equivalents.
He suggests because agriculture is not now part of current carbon trading schemes in Australia, the $600 million is in effect revenue lost to the agricultural sector.
If agriculture were part of a national carbon trading scheme then emitters (such as coal-fired power stations) could theoretically purchase woody vegetation from farmers as carbon equivalents.
The concept of paying for environmental services presupposes the Australian public know what they want from the Australian landscape, and that what they want can be measured.
Better water quality is often mentioned as something people want. Water quality is relatively easily measured and a lot of information on water quality is collected by both local and state governments across Australia.
Access to this information, however, is difficult.
As a first step towards developing a trade in water pollutants, governments would need to make water quality data publicly available -- in itself a considerable achievement.
I am not sure how applicable in practice the concept of tradable markets in environmental services really is.
If Peter Corish's group are to develop a policy framework to "securing Australian agriculture" it will need to get city Australia to consider what environmental services it really wants, how much these services are really worth, and how best to deliver them.
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