Tough year for grains with a silver lining

This year has been ordinary for most grain growers except for a few pockets in Central Queensland, who received some rain early from Cyclone Debbie and managed to get under a few mid-season falls to keep things growing.

Unseasonably warm winter weather followed by weeks of frosts was almost too much for some, who were already facing less than optimal yield projections.

On the positive side, prices have been strong, especially for barley, with the feed market being short. We even saw grain being shipped from the south to meet malt and feed demand.

2017 also included some big wins with AgForce and GrainCorp securing a State Government co-contribution towards GrainCorp’s state of the art handling facility at Yamala.

Government investment in ag rail is rare these days and while we still want to see investments in Moura, Goondiwindi and Dalby, it’s a good first step. Pushing transport prices down remains a priority of AgForce Grains and we will continue to work with other stakeholders to help find efficiencies in the supply chain.

Continuing a great tradition, AgForce hosted another fantastic Grains Gala Dinner in Goondiwindi in September, with a focus on innovation. Goondiwindi is home to so many great innovations and it was great to celebrate that in such a vital grain producing region of Queensland.

With the harvest behind us for another year and as we look to 2018, it’s worth thinking about stocks information and whether we as growers think more information will further help improve grower returns.

Too often, growers have the least amount of information in the supply chain and naturally we need to sell first. AgForce and Grain Producers Australia are exploring how to address this information gap to add more value for you, the growers.

Grain stocks reporting is already happening overseas in places like the United States and if we are to boost competition and improve prices, Australia can’t be left behind.