Federal Minister for Agriculture David Littleproud on Monday morning announced a new Australian Agriculture visa that would start in late September.

The new overseas worker visa could offer permanent residency pathways for migrants who spend three years working in agriculture, meat processing, fisheries and forestry.

Teys corporate and industry affairs manager John Langbridge, whose company operates an abattoir at Bomen with about 800 workers, welcomed the principle behind the new visa.

"We haven't seen the fine print of the Australian Agriculture visa yet, but in principle it seems like something we'd be very supportive of," he said.

"A visa like this would be good for the industry in the long term, but because of COVID it will be hard to deliver quickly."

Last year Teys said it was struggling to fill about 40 vacant positions in Wagga.

NSW farmers Wagga branch president Alan Brown said grain farmers might struggle to use the scheme to find workers for the harvest.

"It will certainly be a help to horticulture and meat processors; I'm not so sure about he grains industry as the jobs are a different skillset that is not widely held in southeast Asia," he said.

"Overall it's a good outcome for agriculture as we are desperately short of labourers."

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The new visa was designed to replace incentives for overseas backpackers to work on farms.

Despite the federal government encouraging Australians to take up farm work, Mr Brown said the industry was still reliant on overseas workers.

Batlow Fruit Company director and apple grower Greg Mouat said anything that would help get time-dependent crops picked "has got to be a good thing".

Riverina MP Michael McCormack said the visa had come at the right time.

"It is important our farmers have the confidence to plant a crop and know they will have access to a reliable workforce to assist during harvest, and this visa will deliver just that," he said.

Labor duty Senator for the Riverina Deborah O'Neill said farmers had suffered a "shambolic" three-year delay for new visa to be created.

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