Member for Cootamundra, Steph Cooke, is calling on the NSW Minister for Agriculture to urgently deliver a fair compensation package for blue mallee and broombush farmers who have been unable to operate for nearly two years due to restrictive native vegetation mapping.

Ms Cooke said the Agriculture Minister had been “missing in action” throughout the ongoing crisis, despite the devastating impact the government’s decisions were having on farming families, regional jobs, and agricultural production across the Bland Shire.

“This is fundamentally an agriculture issue, yet the Agriculture Minister has failed to stand up for the farmers and businesses being crippled by these decisions,” Ms Cooke said.

“If the government is going to prevent farmers from using their land, then it has an obligation to properly compensate them for the losses they are being forced to carry.”

The issue centres on so-called “pink mapping,” where private land has been classified as Category 2 - Sensitive Regulated Vegetation on the government’s draft Native Vegetation Regulatory Map.

The designation severely restricts farming activity, leaving many producers unable to harvest or manage sustainably coppiced blue mallee and broombush plantations that have been managed by local families for generations.

Large areas of farmland across the Bland Shire were mapped as “pink,” leaving some businesses without income for almost two years and forcing others to close their doors.

Following strong advocacy from affected landholders and the local Member, the Environment Minister ordered reviews into the mapping and ecological status of the affected areas. However, farmers were warned that participating in the review process could result in even more of their land being classified as sensitive vegetation.

In response, Ms Cooke introduced legislation in 2025 to allow affected farmers to resume traditional coppicing while environmental reviews were undertaken transparently and in consultation with landholders.

The bill was defeated after Labor and the Greens voted against it.

Ms Cooke said the government had since failed to provide any practical pathway forward for affected farmers, making compensation an urgent necessity while the broader issue remained unresolved.

“Compensation should not replace the need to fix the underlying problem,” Ms Cooke said.

“The government still needs to remove the critically endangered status over their land and deliver certainty for these communities, but while farmers remain locked out of their livelihoods, they deserve proper compensation.”

Last year, the Biodiversity Conservation Trust launched the Northern Riverina Woodlands conservation tender, offering annual payments of between $33 and $52 per hectare for permanent conservation agreements. Ms Cooke said this fell dramatically short of the $400 to $500 per hectare many producers previously earned through sustainable harvesting.

She also warned that banks had begun factoring the mapping into property valuations, reducing equity and affecting farming businesses' ability to borrow and plan for the future.

“We cannot allow a precedent in NSW where the government can effectively take away a farmer’s ability to use their land without accountability or fair compensation,” Ms Cooke said.

“The Agriculture Minister needs to stop avoiding this issue, sit down with affected landholders, and fight for a fair compensation package that reflects the real losses these families have suffered.”