No crop composition change yet

Hannah Jansen, chief analyst with Australian Crop Forecasters (ACF) said she would be waiting before early autumn before starting to think about a change in crop composition.

“It’s a positive sign, especially for those guys who were impacted by drought last year, but I don’t think anyone would be making changes to their winter crop rotation based solely on what has happened this year.”

Ms Jansen said southern zone croppers had been hit hard by last year’s drought and as such may be more risk averse this year.

“Obviously, at face value, more moisture would mean growers are more likely to take a risk, but equally there will probably be farmers who will need more rain again before contemplating changing from set rotations.”

Ms Jansen said while many croppers claimed not to change rotations according to values at sowing, price would be a factor leading into winter crop sowing.

“We saw it with the summer crop, people followed the dollars into cotton and mung beans.

“Farmers say they don’t chase price, but it is certainly an element.”

However, she said, agronomically, there would be limits on how far growers could expand acreage in price advantaged crops such as chickpeas.

“Last year, chickpea plantings increased markedly, up 85pc in Queensland and 41pc in NSW, the major production states.

“Already this year, bodies such as Pulse Australia have warned about the danger of chickpea on chickpea rotations.”

Tottenham, NSW farmer Terry Fishpool said he did not expect too much of a swing into chickpeas despite good opening rains in his Central West region.

“People know that prices in the smaller crops can move around quite a bit, so I don’t expect everyone to rush into wall to wall chickpeas just because the price is good at present.”

His views were echoed by John Shepherd, secretary of the Conservation Agriculture and No Till Farmers Association (CANFA) based out of Dubbo.

“People will be doing their crop plans up over the next month, but I wouldn’t expect massive changes based on the rain.”

However, Michael Moodie, Mallee Sustainable Farming (MSF), a farming group with members across southern NSW, northern Victoria and the South Australian Mallee said he believed there would be a swing away from cereals in his area.

“Farmers will be looking at break crops, just because they have had cereal heavy rotations in the past couple of years and will want a chance to control grass weeds.”

Further south, Cam Taylor, commercial services manager with Birchip Cropping Group (BCG), based in Victoria’s southern Mallee, said he was expecting there would be more broadleaf crops.

“I’m expecting a bit more canola and people with the right soil types will have a look at lentils.

“Obviously the prices can move around quickly in the pulse sector, so there will be that consideration with lentils, but at present prices are good.

“The broadleaf crops will provide different modes of chemistry to control grass weeds.”