Federal and State agricultural ministers are yet to flesh out the details surrounding the Federal Government's latest $320 million drought assistance package.

But Federal Agricultural Minister Barnaby Joyce said at the Northern Beef Industry Forum last week there will be no set allocation of funding for WA.

"We will deal with the issues pertinent to drought, not with lines on maps," Mr Joyce said.

"We know around Southern Cross farmers are experiencing drought, so they are just as entitled to access the money as someone in Queensland, New South Wales or the Northern Territory.

"That is a negotiated process we will be looking through, we set criteria but within that criteria the state will sort it out.

"I am not a member of the WA parliament and don't have the right to determine how they wish to administer this, we put down guiding principles and people can work it out from there."

In his first trip to WA since his appointment to the ministry, Mr Joyce said he was working with State ministers in a negotiated way to establish how to assist people to get through the issues pertinent to drought.

WA Agriculture Minister Ken Baston welcomed the package, and noted the extreme nature of drought in NSW and Queensland.

"We have a strip of drought in the eastern Wheatbelt although we have had record harvests in WA last year, some 16 million tonnes," Mr Baston said.

"We still have a pocket that has suffered and had no crop at all.

"There is also a strip in the rangelands in the West Gascoyne which has been extremely dry.

"The rest of the State has had some fantastic rain so we don't have the same pressures as Queensland and NSW, but we certainly do have pressures on anyone who hasn't had an income."

The assistance package announced last week will allow farmers to apply for loans of up to $1m, or up to 50 per cent of eligible debt.

The loans will be made available at a variable interest rate, starting at 4pc for a term of up to five years.

Source - http://www.farmweekly.com.au/