Haha, Bushie Bill, I think it's safe to say... YOU'VE BEEN TOLD!!! :P

Mmm yum...lucerne. That'll fill me up! Try eating that for breakfast

An accessible example of prime minesite rehabilitation (EPA guidelines) is North Stradbroke Island where Consolidated Rutile’s natural ecosystem rehabilitation program has been recognised for excellence, including the 2008 EPA Sustainable Industries Awards.

One example of Class A agricultural land rehabilitation is in the NSW Hunter Valley adjacent to the Hunter Valley No 1 coal mine, near Lemington.

The site was formerly a 90m deep pit, now restored to production and growing lucerne. Suggest viewing on Google Earth at coordinates Latitude 32° 30’ S; Longitude 151°59’ E.

If 'Bushie Bill' is really a bushie then he should be a lot more protective of land (ours/his) than his comments would suggest. I wonder if he has given any thought to what would happen if the mining companies were given free reign over any land they desire. And the MAIN reason they are going down the mining road is of course, big profits. Too much of our food already is sourced from overseas, and as has been revealed, it's quality is questionable at times. The Gov't Members should hang their heads in shame at their willingness to allow ruination of prime farmland, as in the Felton area. How would THEY like a large open-cut mine in their backyards? Government of, for and by the people? What a JOKE!

Today we suffer from only thinking of today, not in 2 or 3 hundred years - digging up carbon and burning it only makes a dirty world dirtier. Isn't it time we showed that we are actually the smartest animal on earth and did something smart and look after and take pride in our farm land. And if our politicians could actually think past the next election they would agree as they do in Europe where the farmers are looked after.

Fundamental in this discussion is the unequal rights that mining interests hold over all other land uses. It really calls for far better strategic and regional level planning that takes into account long-term issues of food production (which in the end is about national food security), water supply/quality, biodiversity conservation, and sustainable energy production. And of course, how all these are likely to be impacted by climate uncertainty into the future. As well as the conflict on productive agricultural lands, of great concern currently is the threat that mining poses to recognised conservation areas. The Desert Uplands is one such area where an 8000 hectare property covered by a Nature Refuge Agreement (which was purchased with the assistance of federal National Reserve System program) is in line to be sacrificed to produce more climate changing coal. There is currently a petition running to protect this and all other nature refuges from mining in Queensland (www.bimblebox.org). It only takes an economic recession for the mining industry to lay off its workers without pay (no unionism in mines, get the best pay in Australia but no safety nets when the industry collapses). Surely we can come up with something less fickle for our state revenue than dependency on an industry based on finite resources that forsakes that longer term priorities of environmental health and secure food production?

Bushie Bill can't be serious. The current value is surely not the only criteria we should use. Why would Bill pay insurance on his house, it is cheaper to not insure? If you are sure you will not have a fire. Keeping our prime ag land as a productive resource is surely the best insurance there is that mankind will never starve. UN and FAO and our PM have all predicted a Global Food Crisis, so we need our insurance. Surely 2 percent of our state set aside till we are sure there is no other coal to mine is reasonable? If we decide we no longer need food in 20 years time, the coal will still be there. Why is Bill so averse to having a plan? Many miners themselves want a plan, just ask Linc Energy or Santos. Grow up Bill.

To the uneducated Bushie Bill, It defies logic that the land would be permanently destroyed? Obviously you do not understand that digging a big hole tends to remove the soil on top. The soil that has taken thousands of years to be placed there along with its nutrients and life-giving qualities, the soil that grows food that you eat! Ever hear of a Delta region, a floodplain, a map, geography, history? I don’t see any post holes growing crops, how much grass grows under your house? How much is growing where the council has dug a footpath? Low and behold, I think I might even have topsoil in the garden! Fancy that, to get my plants to grow I have topsoil! Hyperbole?...Perhaps you have the unfortunate understanding that your food comes from the cupboard or the fridge and that quality is determined by the depth of the shelf or the coolness of the fridge. Travel and see the world my friend and you will be squarely faced with the fact that Australia’s food is the best in the world, its quality starts with the ground it is planted in. I don’t see a nice 9 grain bread loaf in Egypt, I don’t see healthy corn on the menu in Italy, I don’t see pumpkin in the shops in Europe, I don’t see affordable meat, meat that is feed by grasses and grain grown in topsoil, I don’t see fresh fruit markets, I don’t see healthy salads in Demark, without exaggeration I don’t see anywhere in the world that has the availability and quality of the food we do, do you?

Remediation? perhaps your history is a little shot too? Show me one place where soil has been removed and once again ‘remediated’ to grow crops? I have seen where whole civilizations have collapsed because of a shift in where the topsoil is. Look at the Mesopotamia region, once a thriving civilization of health and growth, now merely a battle ground for oil, whilst the people who live there struggle in poverty, no food, no development, no growth, no life. Egypt and northern Africa is crumbling under its own famine, The Delta regions have reduced, South America and its mountain civilizations became extinct because of lack of food growing regions easily accessible to them, regions of Central Africa, the centre of Australia. The United Kingdom and Ireland only was able to progress through the middle ages and grow their population because they were able to feed themselves (they introduced the potato and grew it in topsoil!!). Populations and health increase because of the availability and quality of food. People need to live where there is a sustainable food source. Toowoomba is Australia's largest inland city, why, because of the rich food sources that surround it, determined by the quality of the topsoil! Highest economic return? Look at the Middle East, Africa, areas of South America as examples - it's been tried and proven wrong that by gathering a high economic return by digging up resources the country will succeed. They dig up resources, pump oil and gas and still the entire countries live in poverty. Why? Because they have no food! They can’t grow it, there is no good land left, the money doesn’t go towards importing quality food to make up the shortfall. The cultural, social, historic or national values – exactly, look at those, I know I would rather all of those things to be focused on being able to eat, live and be healthy. Go and visit some countries where there is no food and test your values then, hope you don’t get mugged or stabbed for that meal you have.

Self-serving nonsense? I suggest you join the Red Cross, be a UN volunteer, read a book! Go and see for yourself the changes that undergo a civilization that has no food. Sure we may be a net exporter now, but please check population expansion graphs, then look and see the food expansion graphs and use a bit of perception to put the two together. Our food recipients have lost their topsoil because people with attitudes like you have dug up the land so they can fight over oil and other resources. They are from civilizations that once had ready access to food, all because they lived in regions of good topsoil, the Delta regions, the flood plains. Perhaps you missed the news? Perhaps you also missed the instruction and development Australia gives to struggling nations about food growth, by the quality of Australian crops can these initiatives be undertaken. How? With the preservation of topsoil here we can test and implement new techniques. Perhaps you should head on over to the countries and try and grow some crops in land that has no topsoil?

Those self interest groups really bug me too, how dare they decide to jeopardize the countries food bowl (that’s the thing Kevin Rudd said we need to expand! Try reading The Australian one day) for a financial gain to export some coal. Higher rates and taxes for higher possible economic return? If it was such a profitable business, I’d suggest there would be a lot more farmers than those living in the city don’t you? The shortfall comes when we run out of food. Yes, who will be making up the food shortfall then? You Bushie Bill?

Using premium farming land for mining coal is surely a short sighted and horrendously detrimental act. 2-3pc of Qld is classed as inherently fertile, premium farming land - can this not by saved for producing food? What bothers me is that this is a double edged sword. Mining companies will come and mine the land, produce copious amounts of greenhouse gases which the will have to offset by buying up more land and planting trees - tying up more valuable farming land! Rehabilitation is a farce and that is obvious - QRC may as well come out and say that they intend to mine the class A farming country and in 20 years time dump contaminated rubble void of anything they want back in the hole and leave it "rehabilitated". Where they will get the soil to fill in the hundreds of millions of tonnes of coal they removed is anyone’s guess - my guess is they probably won't, and instead of a rich and fertile floodplain, we will be left with a saline swamp with negligible value. Bushie Bill, it would be great to have a response from you on these 4 pages of comments against your ramblings.

In this day and age with the looming threat of climate change - be it natural or man made, and with the rapidly developing technologies for renewable energy from surface resource, there is no continuing need to rampantly destroy our natural landscapes - particularly ones that put food on our tables. The investors who put money in to these dirty money laundering schemes known as mining need to have a long hard look at themselves, and those who receive the royalties - I don't know how they sleep at night. Why isn't this money going to renewable energy development and research - who is to say that won't be just as lucrative? This land has been feeding Australia and the world for a hundred or more years, why rape it for less than 30 years of profits? (especially if we can’t live that long with no food on our tables)