It's hard to believe that it is harvest time again.
It feels like yesterday - not a year ago - that we were talking to producers and preparing ourselves to receive a second bumper harvest for Western Australia's graingrowers.
Before I move on to our harvest preparations for the 2023/24 season, I want to acknowledge and celebrate the State's graingrowers - your resilience, innovation and fortitude that has resulted in two record back-to-back harvests.
I also want to acknowledge the CBH team that relished in the challenge of receiving, storing and outturning this huge crop that feeds countries around the world.
Coincidently, we received our first delivery for the current season on Wednesday, September 27 - exactly one year to the day that we received our first load for the 2022/23 season.
Apart from it being the same day and in the Geraldton zone, this year's season is very different to last year.
The weather hasn't been as consistent or kind across all zones and we are seeing variations across WA's growing regions.
We know it will be a mixed bag across the grainbelt and people who had above average years recently may not experience the same successful conditions this year.
The upcoming harvest reminds us of the highs and lows of farming, and while we need to be mindful of the variable nature of grain growing, we need to maintain focus on ensuring our network is ready for the challenges that come with larger harvests in the future.
Despite the outlook for this year being below the past two records, the future of WA agriculture is bright.
Over the past year, we have been focused on executing our Path to 2033 Strategy as part of our commitment to sustainably create and return value for WA growers, both current and future.
This strategy is focused on preparing CBH to be able to consistently receive average crops of 22 million tonnes and export 3mt per month by 2033 to ensure we can continue to generate value for growers.
With that in mind, I am pleased to say that CBH's supply chain has had its best year on record, outturning nearly 22mt for the shipping calendar year.
This includes 19.8mt exported, 1.7mt in domestic outturns and about 561,000t in other outturns.
I want to thank all our employees, contractors, and growers for the role they played in delivering this result safely and demonstrating our ability to rise to the challenge.
This feat has never been achieved in our co-operative's 90-year history and deserves to be celebrated.
Reaching this milestone also means that we are close to sustainably achieving our first horizon target of exporting a monthly target of 2mt by 2024.
Importantly, moving this record amount means that our carry-over has been reduced to 5.5mt at the end of September, and with a sustained performance throughout October, our carry-over will be reduced to about 4mt as we enter the full throes of harvest at the start of November.
I'd like to take you through how you can prepare to make harvest with CBH an efficient experience.
As with previous years, the CDF app will provide you with important harvest updates regarding site opening and closing times, services and segregations just to name a few.
Please ensure you have updated the CDF app and have notifications turned on, so you don't miss anything.
Offensive behaviour, violence, aggression, bullying and harassment will not be tolerated at any CBH site.
Breaches of site safety rules will be taken seriously, and time penalties can be imposed on individuals and vehicles entering CBH sites, based on the severity and regularity of breaches.
CBH has removed the limit for grain colour in barley for the 2023/24 harvest, in line with the resolution made by the Grains Industry Association of WA Receival Standards Review Committee in 2022.
The current barley receival standards are published on the CBH website but we acknowledge that the limit change was overlooked in the printed version of the Operations Harvest Guide.
In addition, we have also made changes to how we grade wheat and barley, so please be sure to download a copy of our Harvest Guide 2023/24 from the CBH website or contact the Grower Service Centre (GSC) to have a hard copy mailed to you.
From a CBH Marketing and Trading perspective, there will be no contracting limitations this season, and growers will be able to access cash contracts and pools without restrictions, with no staggered pricing times, trading lockouts or contracting volume limits.
CBH harvest pools opened on October 9 for contracting or direct nomination and are available to all growers - you do not need to be a past user to sell into a pool.
Please contact our GSC for any support you need during harvest.
From mid-October they have been operating on extended hours from 7am to 6pm, Monday to Friday, and 8am to 12pm on Saturdays, and can be contacted on 1800 199 083 and growerservicecentre@cbh.com.au
Wishing you a safe and happy harvest.
