The Western Australian grain harvest is expected to deliver 12.5 million tonnes during the 2005-06 season, according to Cooperative Bulk Handling Group, making it the second largest harvest on record for the state.
The Western Australian grain harvest is expected to deliver 12.5 million tonnes during the 2005-06 season, according to Cooperative Bulk Handling Group, making it the second largest harvest on record for the state.
This was despite frost damage which meant WA fell short of initial expectations of a 12.8mt harvest.
Around 200,000 to 400,000 tonnes is expected to come in over the next few weeks as growers in the south of the state complete their harvesting programs and growers deliver from on-farm storages.
Wheat deliveries made up around 70 per cent of the total grain deliveries this harvest, with barley receivals comprising 20 per cent of the total. Other grains received this harvest included canola, lupins, oats, field peas and chick peas.
Operations manager David Fienberg, said while the 2005-06 harvest was continually delayed by rain, the majority of the crop still managed to come in by Christmas 2005.
"The delivery rate at sites continues to increase each year as a result of greater efficiencies by growers and a number of strategies put in place by the CBH Group throughout the year.
"The $51 million invested in improving our storage facilities across the state in 2005, adding to the half a billion dollars invested into the network system since 1999, has further enabled the most efficient use of space and infrastructure during this harvest.
In the meantime, CBH's second application to the Wheat Export Authority to supply WA wheat to its Interflour mills in Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam was recently vetoed by AWB International for the second time, with CBH chief executive Imre Mencshelyi hitting out against the WEA.
Western Australian growers showed strong support for the CBH initial proposal, through their commitment of 100,000 tonnes to the Interflour Premium Pool within nine hours of the Pool's opening, according to the coop.
Mr Mencshelyi said he was extremely disappointed by the WEA and AWB's response and handling of the matter.
"Once again, the growers of WA are missing out on a golden opportunity and are being disadvantaged by a wheat marketing system that is clearly inflexible and unworkable in its current form," he said.
"Our application presents a unique opportunity for the growers of Western Australia to supply wheat direct to their own milling facilities.
"AWB's claim that the granting of this licence would open up the floodgates for other entities to export direct to their flour mills is ridiculous and I challenge AWB to find one other real example of an Australian farmer co-operative seeking to supply to their own mills.
"As I have said before, this application was not about the CBH Group seeking to be a marketer of Australian wheat into the Indonesian, Malaysian and Vietnamese markets. It was simply creating the opportunity for growers in Western Australia to supply wheat direct to their mills in Asia, via a supply chain that has the ability to realise value back to those participating growers.
"If granted, the licence would have displaced wheat currently sourced by Interflour from non-Australian origins of supply and therefore represented no threat to the Single Desk or the value of the National Pool.
"AWB continues to question the licence application and why the 100,000 tonnes could not be sourced through the National Pool. The answer is very simple. A direct relationship between growers and their flour mills in Asia creates an extra $10 per tonne of value by maximising efficiencies and removing AWB's redundant marketing costs usually applied to a transaction that is already assured by the CBH Group's investment in Interflour.
"This application offered significant financial benefit and we are currently looking at a range of further options to ensure that Western Australian growers do not miss out."
