THE costs of not providing adequate timely service to our customers could be way more expensive than the millions of dollars it is costing grain growers on demurrage.
Time to get on with the job revamping Tier 3 lines is essential.
In 2010 the Wheatbelt Railway Retention Alliance (WRRA) was formed to try to bring all players together to keep grain on rail.
It is great to see the Federal and State governments working together with $160 million of Infrastructure Australia Funds and an additional $40m from the State government. - $200m is now in the WA coffers.
There is more money to come to build an efficient rail that has more carting capacity than the majority of existing rail lines.
As growers it is important that CBH looks at the least-cost pathways from paddock to port, taking into consideration things like safety, community impact, and carbon foot print objectives and so on.
Rail is 17 times more energy efficient than road transport per tonne with far less carbon pollution and community impact by removing trucks from our roads.
We as grower members insist that CBH do all in its power to support the rebuild and replacement of Tier 3 lines as per the Agonis Engineering Report conducted by the State Government recommending; 19 tonne axle loading, concrete sleepers and 80 kilometre an hour lines.
The CBH board needs to clearly demonstrate least-cost pathways to port based on the criteria laid down in this report and take into account the National Farmers' Federation objectives of "farm energy sources to be 50 per cent renewable by 2030 and for agriculture to be trending towards Carbon Neutral by the same year".
As Western Australian grain growers continue to increase production the need for increased rail capacity and output is paramount.
The average life of a mine using rail is five to 30 years - farming is here forever and rail can definitely be justified.
In a news article on June 17, CBH's acting chief executive officer Ben Macnamara stated that nearly $1 billion of grower funds have been invested into additional storage in recent times and intends to continue spending $250m per year of grower funds in coming years.
Yet despite this massive investment, we still have the highest demurrage costs maybe in the history of CBH because we cannot get enough grain to port fast and efficiently.
CBH - it is time to listen to your members, 240 of which met at Kulin last year sending a unanimous and clear message they wanted Tier 3 rail reopened and operating.
GREG RICHARDS
Farmer and WRRA chairman
Quairading
