Flooding set to slash sugar exports Padraic Murphy | March 06, 2008
HEAVY rains have returned with a vengeance to rain-soaked north Queensland, flooding homes, cutting roads and prompting warnings that export income from the state's $1billion sugar industry will be slashed by up to 20 per cent.
Holloways Beach cane farmer - walks through his sugar cane which has been affected by flooding. Picture: Brian Cassey
With Mackay, Townsville and Rockhampton still reeling from floods, Cairns was hit yesterday with 200mm of rain on top of the heavy falls the city has been getting since late last year.
About 100 homes were flooded in Cairns and nearby centres as State Emergency Service volunteers rushed hundreds of sandbags to the worst-affected areas.
Authorities urged residents to stay home as road closures caused traffic chaos.
Further north, Port Douglas received 440mm of rain yesterday, stranding residents in their homes and causing road collapses. A landslide closed the Kuranda Range Road to the Atherton Tableland, while the Cairns northern beachside suburbs of Holloways Beach, Yorkeys Knob and Machans Beach are expected to be cut off for several days until floods subside.
SES spokeswoman Kylie McIntosh said crews responded to 86 requests for sandbagging and tarping around Innisfail, Cairns and Port Douglas.
Police said some drivers were bypassing the road barricades and becoming stranded in rising floodwaters.
Police spokeswoman Cary Coolican said such drivers were placing an unnecessary burden on emergency services.
Cane farmers, who less than a month ago were upbeat about a bumper season, are now predicting harvests will be cut heavily as floods damage crops and leave fields strewn with debris. Canegrowers chief executive Ian Ballantyne said farmers were expecting up to a 20 per cent drop in production.
"It's not just the flooding, it's the overcast conditions," Mr Ballantyne said. "Cane needs sunlight to grow."
Ross Parisi, a third-generation canefarmer from Holloways Beach, north of Cairns, said he had been optimistic until recently. "We were looking at a good season, and now I reckon we'll be lucky to break even," Mr Parisi said.
"Cane is usually quite hardy, but with the winds we had a couple of weeks ago, and now the floods, there'll be quite a bit ofdamage."
Debris being dumped in fields by flooding across north Queensland over the past two months may force a return to a now-rare Queensland practice - the burning of sugarcane fields.
"I reckon a lot of farmers will have to consider it this year," Mr Parisi said.
"This is the second time the Barron River delta has flooded in two weeks, and it's brought a lot of debris and silt down from the tablelands."
