A MAN duped into buying dirt he thought was fertiliser from a Chinese Government website is facing bankruptcy.
Condobolin man Brett Reardon is being sued for $100,000 by a company he imported the fertiliser for and a creditor he traded with.
He had made a deal with an importer to buy fertiliser from China. He then advertised to sell the "fertiliser" cheaper than the going rate for fertiliser.
Mr Reardon took up to $50,000 from several farmers.
But, when it arrived, the shipment turned out to be 596 tonnes of contaminated dirt.
The company the importer got it from had advertised on a Chinese Government website.
Efforts to track down the company have failed. Mr Reardon understands the dirt was eventually sent back to China.
Mr Reardon's company, Country Fertilisers, has gone into liquidation.
Mr Reardon said he was "up s--- creek".
"At the moment I'm just trying to keep my house," he said.
"I'm doing a bit of tractor driving at the moment. I've got barely enough to pay the mortgage and feed my kids."
None of the farmers involved had launched legal action against him although Mr Reardon understands they may be legally unable to.
The "fertiliser" was $500 a tonne cheaper than it would have cost locally.
"A few of the farmers are pretty (upset) and that's understandable," Mr Reardon said.
"They'd forked out $50,000 and still had to buy fertiliser and it (the cost of local fertiliser) had gone up by then."
Mr Reardon said he aimed to get a "resolution for the blokes after me" and would then consider his next move.
Attempts to contact the importer who organised the deal for Mr Reardon failed.
The Australian Quarantine Inspection Service said the product entered Australia without inspection because "it was an unusual consignment and was incorrectly declared as a low-risk product".
