General News
6 April, 2026
Regional community maps the risks to its own food supply
Farmers, emergency managers, welfare workers, local business people and government representatives gathered in Horsham last month to take a hard look at where the Wimmera Southern Mallee's food system is most exposed.
Farmers, emergency managers, welfare workers, local business people and government representatives gathered in Horsham last month to take a hard look at where the Wimmera Southern Mallee's food system is most exposed.
The forum, organised by the WSM Food Security Resilience Lab, worked through the drivers, risks and threats facing regional food security -- and the actions the community can take in response.
What came back was direct.
The region grows a significant share of Victoria's grain, but it depends almost entirely on imported fuel, fertiliser and crop chemicals to do it.
Any disruption to those supply chains hits here harder than almost anywhere else in the state.
During the day fuel emerged as the sharpest immediate risk.
Despite this Agriculture is not on the national emergency fuel list - something that needs to change.
Hostilities in the Middle East have already pushed fuel prices up. Our farmers and distributors are carrying that exposure with very little policy backup.
Since the forum, we have mapped decades of fuel policy decisions and traced their impact at the regional and local level.
That timeline is available at fuelsupplychainhistorywsm.netlify.app and is worth reading if you want to understand how the region got to where it is.
Other issues raised by participants included:
Fertiliser and farm chemicals. The region relies heavily on imports and participants called for more work on local and Australian alternatives.
GPS, connectivity and cybersecurity. Modern farming depends on precision technology and with disruptions already happening -- this is not a future risk.
Housing and workforce. Without affordable housing, the agronomists, truck drivers and processing workers who keep the food system moving don't stay. The region can't grow and move food without people, and it can't keep people without somewhere to live.
Household food insecurity. The same region that produces food at scale has families who struggle to afford it. Several support programs in the area exist almost entirely on volunteer labour - a fragile foundation.
Misinformation about farming. Participants identified growing public misunderstanding of agricultural practices as a risk worth addressing through better local storytelling.
This forum showed what was possible when the community came together across sectors.
Fuel, housing, food access, workforce are not separate problems - they connect.
Getting people in a room who don't usually talk to each other was the point.
Over the coming months, the Lab's Project Control Group will work through the forum findings to identify three or four priority actions for the region.
The WSM Food Security Resilience Lab is led by WSM Development and funded by the Foundation for Rural and Regional Renewal.
To read a quick background to Australian fuel policy and its impact on the region click https:/fuelsupplychainhistorywsm.netlify.app.