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Almost 11 years ago, the global climate conference in Paris adopted an agreement billed by environmental advocates and political leaders as a transformative new deal. Its objective was simple: reduce the world's reliance on fossil fuels and slow the pace of global warming.

The Paris Agreement was designed to address the risks of rising seas, extreme droughts, floods and storms by limiting the increase in global average temperatures to well below 2°C, while pursuing efforts to limit warming to 1.5°C.

Now, more than a decade into what was effectively a two-decade transition, the results are mixed. The promise of affordable renewable energy remains out of reach for many Australians. Instead of democratising energy production and delivering benefits to local communities, policy has increasingly favoured large corporations and multinational interests, reinforcing market concentration and dependence on government support.

Few would argue with the importance of environmental stewardship or the need to leave the next generation with a healthy and productive landscape. The question is not whether emissions should be reduced. The question is how.

National energy, environmental and planning policies are increasingly dividing communities, with many of the impacts borne by rural and regional Australia. Save us from the overzealous, that we might be allowed to be contrarian in opinion, a point of view to argue for sensible policy settings and we engage in debate on how best to balance environmental objectives with economic prosperity and food security.

Rather than reshaping the economy, we have shifted decision-making from consumers and communities back to governments, and the old money of large corporations and financial institutions. In some cases, we have weakened domestic industries only to import products from countries with lower environmental standards and higher emissions intensity.

The architects of the Paris Agreement recognised the unique position of agriculture. They understood that food production is not optional. As populations grow, productive farming systems become more important, not less.

Article 2(1)(b) of the Paris Agreement states that climate action should involve:
"Increasing the ability to adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change and foster climate resilience and low greenhouse gas emissions development, in a manner that does not threaten food production."

That principle should be central to every climate policy.

Yet the actions of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation raise serious questions about whether that principle is being upheld.

The CEFC has directed public finance benefiting major corporations, including Ampol and Woolworths-linked projects. It has also provided support to overseas companies and investment vehicles, including Hyundai, Kia and Gresham House. At the same time, it has committed billions of dollars to large scale infrastructure and land use projects, including Marinus Link, Rewiring the Nation and plantation forestry investments.

Whatever the merits of individual projects, the cumulative effect is increasingly visible across regional Australia. Productive agricultural land is being acquired, fragmented or repurposed in pursuit of policy objectives that were never intended to come at the expense of food production.

This outcome is difficult to reconcile with the Paris Agreement's stated objective of addressing climate change in a manner that does not threaten food production. When taxpayer funds contribute to the removal of productive farmland from agricultural use, the policy is at risk of undermining the very balance the Agreement sought to achieve.

Climate policy should focus first on the largest man-made sources of emissions and deliver the democratisation of energy generation to strengthen, rather than weaken, Australia's productive capacity.

The farmer, working in accordance with the natural order of the land, should not become the primary target of policies that diminish food production, erode property rights and transfer public wealth to corporate interests. Climate action and food security are not competing objectives. The Paris Agreement recognised that. Australian policy should do the same.