Week ending Sunday 13 November 2022 report

Over a third of Viterra sites welcomed their first new season deliveries last week, with growers delivering over 338,000 tonnes, taking total 2022/23 deliveries to over 370,400 tonnes.

The majority of tonnes delivered were barley, followed by wheat, canola, lentils and field peas.

Included in the 22 sites that received their first new season deliveries were seven in our Eastern region, officially kicking off harvest in South Australia’s east.

Taplan grower, Neville Nitschke made the first delivery for the region, a load of peas into Loxton on Monday 7 November, and says he is optimistic for the season ahead.

“It’s been a fantastic season so far. I was surprised to be the first load for the region,” Neville says.

“Our first delivery of peas went really well. It was a paddock that we sowed early and it looked good all year. We did lose a percentage from the recent hail, but the yield ended up at 1.3 tonne which is great for us.

“We’ll also be harvesting barley and wheat and the early indications are that it could be record yields for us in all varieties.” Read more about our first Eastern region receival.

Viterra’s new Eastern region Operations Manager, Andrew Cannon says he’s excited to be joining Viterra’s extremely experienced team who are geared up for the season ahead.

“Our focus is to support growers to ensure a safe and successful harvest,” Andrew says.

“We will continue working with growers in the coming weeks to ensure our sites are open when they are ready to deliver.”

Deliveries into the Eastern region continued with Monarto South, Werrimull, Tailem Bend and Pinnaroo receiving their first new season deliveries on Monday. Apamurra and Lameroo in the region also took loads later in the week.

In Viterra’s Central region, Ardrossan, Balaklava, Bowmans, Crystal Brook, Port Giles and Snowtown received their first new season deliveries, as well as Cungena, Elliston, Port Neill, Nunjikompita, Penong, Tumby Bay, Warramboo, Witera and Wirrulla in the Western region.

On Thursday, Viterra’s Thevenard site broke its daily receival record with 14,627 tonnes delivered.

Viterra Western region Operations Manager, Nick Pratt says achieving the record so early on in harvest is a great effort by growers, carriers and Viterra employees.

“The team at site did a fantastic job safely and efficiently receiving growers’ grain that broke the previous record set in the 2016/17 harvest,” Nick says.

“We have been working hard to ensure we are turning deliveries around as quickly as possible so growers can get their crop off when the weather permits.

“We thank growers for their continued support as we work to receive the large crop on the Eyre Peninsula, and are looking forward to hopefully breaking many more records this harvest.”

Viterra also loaded our first new season grain train at our Bowmans site during the week.

Viterra Central region Operations Manager, Jack Tansley says we loaded the train with 3000 tonnes of barley destined for Outer Harbor to help accumulate grain for Viterra’s first 2022/23 bulk shipment of South Australian grain.

“It’s great to see growers’ grain already moving to port ready for shipping to international markets,” Jack says.

“We have also started moving grain by truck for shipping and overflow to ensure growers have enough storage capacity, which is important in a busy harvest.”

Viterra has a bumper shipping programme this season, with a record breaking 18 exporters who forward booked a record breaking 7 million tonnes shipping capacity.

This shows the high demand for South Australian grain, and is a fantastic result for our grower customers who have more options when selling their grain in the Viterra network.

Disclaimer
* This data is subject to variation due to individual site operations and the timing of reports.
** The total 2022/23 data includes grain received into Viterra’s storage and handling network since 10 October 2022.