A farmer won an appeal against the Department of Agriculture after proving they did not harvest their crops, they just had not grown due to poor weather.

Under the Unharvested Crops Supports Scheme, one farmer had two parcels of land labelled as non-compliant during an inspection after no unharvested crop was found.

However, the farmer argued that due to bad weather, the crop was not planted until early May and following a drought in June and July, the crop became stunted.

The crop was inspected at that time and geotagged photos submitted, confirming the presence of oats. As the crop was organic, the farmer was restricted from using fertiliser and weeds overtook the crop.

After significant weeding, there were three attempts to harvest in September, but this failed due to bad weather. By November the crop was only viewable in patches.

At an oral hearing of the case, the office accepted the crop was established, managed to best commercial practice and there was no evidence of harvesting.