WA’S harvest ramped up last week with many growers either coming to the end or making it two thirds of the way through their programs.
Despite some weather delays in the south still, the past two weeks saw peak receivals through the CBH network with daily tonnages starting to decrease towards the end of last week.
CBH general manager, operations, David Capper said there had been good tonnages coming through all zones in the past two weeks.
“The Kwinana zone is on track for a potentially record-breaking harvest,” Mr Capper said.
“Before harvest we built one million tonnes of emergency storage at several strategic sites, which have been well utilised and are now starting to fill.
“Road and rail are coming under pressure now to move grain to port to meet the demanding summer shipping program, which is fully booked for all of December and the first half of January.”
According to CBH’s market report, the stop and start nature of harvest continued in the Albany zone last week with a couple of minor rain delays experienced.
“Despite this the zone received 550,000 tonnes for the week taking total receivals to 1.8 million tonnes,” it said.
“As a comparison to the same time last year the zone had received 2.3mt.
“Quality so far has been good with 50pc of the million tonnes of barley received making Malt grades.”
CBH Albany zone manager Greg Thornton said for wheat the protein overall had been above earlier expectations, although there was evidence of lower falling numbers and some downgrading as a result of rain during the harvest period.
“Growers to the north and east of the zone are starting to complete programs with the majority of harvest in these areas expected to be completed by Christmas,” Mr Thornton said.
“Shipping for December remains strong and we will switch our accumulation at country sites from barley to wheat in the coming week.”
CBH said the Esperance zone also had another weather-affected week of harvest last week, although many growers had now finished and were finalising their deliveries.
“We will start to close sites in the next couple of weeks as deliveries dry up – Dunn Rock will be the first and is scheduled to close today,” CBH Esperance zone manager Mick Daw said.
The Geraldton zone was still seeing strong tonnages received with the total tonnage reaching three million tonnes last week.
This was significantly more than the 2.5mt original estimate at the beginning of harvest.
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“We are seeing a bit of pressure and frustration at some sites due to available storage space, but we are working very hard to, where possible, keep services alive and keep deliveries efficient for growers,” CBH Geraldton zone manager Duncan Gray said.
The Kwinana zone had another good harvesting week receiving 1.4mt last week bringing the total for the season to 6.3mt.
“Growers in the north and east of the zone are starting to finish their programs and some sites in these areas will close for the season,” CBH Kwinana assistant zone manager Allan Walker said.
“With a good run heading into Christmas the zone will be very close to our estimate for the season this week.”
