PEAK oil may force farmers to change the way they farm and where they export, according to Sydney University Agriculture and Environment senior lecturer Dr Lindsay Campbell.
Mr Campbell believes farmers will face an increase in the price of chemicals, nitrogen, phosphate and freight costs, caused by increasing energy costs stemming from peak oil.
"It will change the way farmers operate," Dr Campbell said.
As natural gas prices no longer mirror oil prices, they will become harder to predict, and since the price of nitrogen is heavily reliant on natural gas prices, Mr Campbell believes farmers need be be cautious.
"Super phosphate will also rise proportionally to nitrogen because it requires large energy inputs," he said.
"It will affect the world market."
Because of this, one of the biggest challenges Mr Campbell believes farmers will face, will be changing their farming systems and turning the clock back to the 1970s.
"It will be necessary to adopt some of the traditional practices such as growing legumes for their ability to fix nitrogen, because it will save money on fertilisers," he said.
farmonline
