STUART Mussared believes the CBH board needs to reassess its priorities and will push for reform if elected as a director in 2017.
The Cunderdin farmer is contesting the District 2 position on the CBH board, against current director Vern Dempster from Northam (see separate story, page 5).
Mr Mussared runs a 2800 hectare mixed cropping and sheep program east of Cunderdin, with his mother Helen, wife Julie and their three sons.
He is also share-farming his 1600 ha property west of Cunderdin with a neighbour.
Mr Mussared has boardroom experience, being a former member of the Cunderdin Hospital board and is a newly-appointed member of the Cunderdin Farmers' Co-operative board.
He has also served on several community group committees including local sporting clubs and Lions.
Mr Mussared said he had what was required to succeed in the role and was proud of his business acumen.
"CBH should be making decisions based from a business perspective - I think I run a reasonable business and my strength is in figures," he said.
It was ongoing frustrations with CBH that led Mr Mussared to nominate for a position on the board.
"I reckon they've dropped the ball a bit - storage and handling facilities should be put first, not fertilisers and other investments," he said.
"The system failed a little bit this harvest - the Tammin bin closed on December 9.
"At the same time I'm reading how organised, and well-operated the CBH fertiliser business is going, and I think we've got our priorities wrong."
Mr Mussared said CBH needed to be better prepared for bigger harvests and quicker deliveries.
"If we didn't have the frost this year, certain parts of the system would have failed," he said.
"The system really struggled with the record grain deliveries and the lack of rainy days to catch up.
"Some of those bins really need some upgrading and I'd like to see some open 24 hours a day because that's what I think the competition will do.
"I think it's important for growers that CBH is running the business as though there is competition, and not as though its a monopoly because unless there's competition we really don't know how good CBH is."
Mr Mussared said investments made by CBH were not reaping enough rewards for farmers and business decisions needed to be smarter.
"Why would we take money from growers and invest it into something that performs worse than farming?"
"If you want diversity the best way to spread risk is to have the money in growers' pockets from Geraldton to Esperance."
If elected Mr Mussared plans to scrap the rebate system in place at CBH due to its inconsistency and instead focus on reducing upfront grower costs.
"I think they've lost their way in charging us upfront and giving us a rebate later," he said.
"The upfront receival and storage fee needs to be as low as it possibly can be to keep growers in the system.
"If you overcharge them, we risk losing all our bigger growers who will move towards on-farm storage - they're the ones who make the system tick and once we've lost them, we've lost them forever."
Mr Mussared believes further costs could be cut by reducing investments in advertising.
"CBH ads come on the TV and growers are paying for them," he said.
"They're only directed at CBH's 4000 members, you haven't got a chance of gaining any new members.
"Its all public relations and the best public relations you could do for a farmer in the wheatbelt is to stop wasting all that money on advertising and give it back to the grower."
After spending a year preparing for the election, Mr Mussared said he was confident he had established an understanding of what growers wanted.
"CBH needs to listen to its growers - we need facility upgrades, better turn-around times, better opening hours and cheaper fees," he said.
"I think growers should be involved in the big decisions - I'm a big advocate for transparency, openness and accountability."
Mr Mussared said the recent proposal to change the structure CBH should have been put to a grower vote.
"I've got no problem with the board saying this is not a good proposal, but I think the growers should have had a right to vote," he said.
"I don't think it would have got across the line, but if 75 per cent of growers voted for it - then that's democracy."
If elected to the board, Mr Mussared will donate 25pc of his director fee to the Royal Flying Doctor Service and beyondblue.
"I'm running for the board because I'm passionate, its not about the money," he said.
"There's no politics for me - what you see is what you get.
