How Australia’s climate-related financial disclosures could impact agriculture

Australia's climate-related financial disclosure regime introduces new reporting obligations for larger companies, including impacts across agricultural value chains. While the primary goal is to improve transparency, the broader intent is to encourage businesses to manage climate-related risks. The reporting scope covers the entire value chain, requiring companies to consider emissions beyond their own operations.

For agriculture, direct reporting requirements will be limited to very large agricultural operations. However, indirect impacts are expected, as agricultural production is often the greatest source of climate impact and risk within the food value chain. This means farm-level activities will likely be a key focus for food and agriculture companies subject to the regime. The current lack of local, recognised greenhouse gas (GHG) estimation and reporting standards for Australian agriculture poses challenges for consistent accounting under the regime.

Over time, farmers can expect more engagement from commodity buyers on climate topics, which will drive farm emissions measurement. In the short term, it is anticipated that reporting companies will predominantly use indirect, secondary data to fulfil their GHG measurement requirements. This will likely limit near-term, widespread impacts on farmers.