Agricultural asset development and management firm, Alterra, has appointed a new member to its team with Paul Good taking up the position of South West Regional Manager, bringing with him nearly 20 years’ of industry know-how. Alterra is looking to shake up the agribusiness sector with a business model that will see it co-invest with investors in managed crops with avocados looking like being the early opener.
Mr Good is currently the WA director of APAL, the national peak industry body for apple and pear growers. He was also formerly the Operations and Business Development Manager at Newton Orchards, who has been growing apples in south-west of WA since around 1929. Under Mr Good’s stewardship, Newton doubled its apple output and established supply relationships with Coles and Woolworths.Mr Good also managed Newton Orchards’ diversification into avocado growing and importantly, he has a background in Austrade and a number of corporate agricultural companies including Wesfarmers Landmark, the Consolidated Pastoral Company and Milne Feeds Group.
Interestingly, APAL is also the owner of the prominent Pink Lady apple brand that now stretched across some 100 countries.
Alterra’s Managing Director Oliver Barnes said: “Alterra continues to build its execution capabilities in the South-West of Western Australia where it is currently advancing a pipeline of near-term avocado development opportunities.”
“Paul’s hands-on experience in developing and operating agricultural assets in this region will be invaluable as Alterra progresses forward in developing best in class assets”.
Recently Alterra entered into some potentially lucrative agreements that secured it exclusive rights to access quantitative avocado data from another WA producer, French’s Group. The French family established the first commercial-scale avocado crop in WA and has been producing product in WA for about 33 years.Alterra now has access to over 32,000 trees from French’s Pemberton farms that produce more than 5.8 million of the nutrient-packed, in demand fruit each year.Alterra will now look to the science behind the fruit to optimise soil, water and nutrient use and apply this knowledge to generate new crops in under-utilised agricultural lands.The company further built up its technical capabilities last year, with the appointment of veteran agribusiness executive, Brett Heather, as its Chief Operating and Technical Officer.
It also reached an exclusive technical partnership agreement with horticultural expert Tyson Bennett, who specialises in the “outperformance” of high-value tree crops.
In a growing export market, particularly into southeast Asia and an increasing focus on sustainability, Alterra followers will be watching how the new team takes hold.
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By Matt Birney
