The Shepparton East Agricultural Land Use Options study contained estimates that show a stone fruit business generating $50,000 per effective hectare would require a minimum of 10 ha to be viable.
A vegetable farm will require between 7 ha and 20 ha, depending on crop types.
Most farms will also require additional land for access, storage of machinery and sheds.
By comparison, the average area planted with vegetables in Victoria was 63 ha in 2017-18 and 20 ha for pome and stone fruit.
A group of local growers agrees they are too small but disagrees with the report's recommended solution to encourage farmers to buy out their neighbours and get bigger.
Chris Dimit said he couldn’t afford to pay the price of expansion, and his neighbours wouldn’t sell at a price he could stomach.
The report suggested the biggest barrier to increasing farm scale was the uncertainty created by ambiguous planning policy, in particular the identification of Shepparton East as an investigation area for residential and industrial development.
“If agriculture is to be maintained in Shepparton East, it is critical that businesses are able to increase scale, by increasing the size of the farm, switching to higher value horticultural commodities or more intensive production systems such as protected horticulture,” the report states.
So, in order to keep the land productive and active the advice is to remove any prospect of residential or industrial development.
The farmers affected say the opposite should happen.
The 2050 growth plan is still being considered and is expected to come before an additional Greater Shepparton City Council meeting on March 30.
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