Our friends in the Hunter Valley – one of the worlds premium wine growing areas – the Hunter Valley Protection Alliance are 
campaigning to stop this latest rush to drill for coal seam gas in their vineyards.
Now these aren’t ‘mad greenies’. Most of the key players are businessmen who’ve made enough in the city to afford at least a small vineyard. They have the clout to represent a wider cross section of the community, other winegrowers, tradesmen, farmers, commuters and more.
We’ve been retained to guide them in a campaign that makes sure they have a voice in the media and in the ears of relevant politicians, media/political tension that will ultimately ensure the region is protected from this mad new gold rush.
At the heart of the issue is lack of planning. Are we going to have a wine growing area or a gas producing area. The Hunter Valley in New South Wales produ
ces some of the world’s award winning wines and is also this state’s second (after Sydney) most visited tourist destination. But the Valley also lies within a giant saucer shaped coal deposit. For decades coal mines have uncomfortably co-existed with the wine, tourism and thoroughbred industries with assertions of health issues related to dust and noise.
But coal seam gas outlets are more disruptive to the small farms and vineyards. You can’t have both.
You see, you can move a sheep farmer, an egg farmer or a grain producer, but wineries can’t move. The soil, the water, the location are all critical to the grape. Try and relocate the vineyards and the Hunter Valley quality wines die.
Lack of transpanency and community consultation have been a feature of the gas companies’ rush for coal seam gas.
