BUTTERFIELD Beef and Daniels Well Feedlot director Paul O'Meehan, Borden, said WA needed scale and investment.
The Borden feedlot has a 5000-head capacity, which supplies Goodchilds butchers, the Butterfield line for restaurants and service chains, Woolworths and a 120-day grain fed program for Western Meat Packers for the Japanese market.
Mr O'Meehan said WA lacked critical mass at every level when compared to the eastern States.
"We have small producers, small lot feeders, small processors and we have a seasonality problem,'' he said.
"We are expensive and most cattle enterprises run it as the second or third part of the income stream."
Mr O'Meehan said the industry lacked specialised beef consultant and information days.
"The industry was going hard about 30 years ago," he said.
"We now lack youth and we have not embraced technology, like the grains industry."
But Mr O'Meehan said the WA industry was reliable and predictable, with good annual rainfall.
He said if WA industry wanted to grow, it needed more scale.
"We need outside money and we need to invest in people," he said.
"Invest in relationships, invest in people and not businesses.
"Do business with people you trust, who have a good understanding of your business and your goals."
In the past four years Mr O'Meehan's business has grown 400 per cent from outside money.
"Don't be afraid of it," he said.
"Embrace it use it and know it is out there.
"There are a lot of people out there with a pile of money that want to invest in good plans and good projects."
Mr O'Meehan said he would continue to keep growing and he encouraged all producers, no matter how big or small, to do the same.
