Who would have thought it? This year Australian agricultural exports could be just $3 billion less than the darling of every politician and the maker of billionaires in this country, iron ore. The leaders of this land love to wear the high vis vests, helmets and glasses, tug their forelocks and queue up to have a ‘selfie’ with ‘Twiggy’ Forrest and Gina Rhinehart or make sure they are seen wining and dining with the captains of BHP, Rio Tinto and anybody in the A League of world business. I haven’t noticed the Prime Minister or the Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition queuing up to have their selfies taken with the President of the National Farmers Federation or the leaders of our state farmer organisations to say ‘thank you’ for the contribution agriculture is making to the economy of this great country. What a dreadful display of ignorance, an indictment against the government and the opposition of this country that they cannot spare the time to be seen saying ‘thank you’ to the thousands of Australian farmers, for striving to achieve the targets predicted in March of this year by the Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES) that total agricultural production for 2017 will be $63.8 billion and that exports could reach $48.7 billion.