Viterra’s bumper harvest shipping programme is well underway with the company loading South Australian growers’ new season grain on to vessels at five of Viterra’s six port terminals since the start of the season, bound for international markets.
The season’s first vessel, which Viterra loaded at its Thevenard port terminal late last month with 24,000 tonnes of wheat, kicked off the record breaking 7 million tonnes of forward shipping that has been booked by a record 18 exporters in the Viterra network.
New season grain has since started shipping from Viterra’s Port Lincoln, Wallaroo, Outer and Inner Harbour port terminals, which is exciting news for South Australian growers who will soon start to see their wheat, barley, canola, faba beans and lentils reach end use customers around the world.
Viterra Chief Operations Officer, James Murray says Viterra’s focus on offering an efficient service to buyer customers provides value to all participants in the supply chain.
“Growers who deliver to Viterra have more choice when selling their grain. In total, we have over 45 buyers in our system, and so far this season, 23 are posting prices and/or have bought grain,” James says.
“Exporters have booked 25 million tonnes of shipping capacity over the next five years from our ports, and we expect to see strong demand for the short term capacity we make available each year closer to harvest. This gives growers confidence in future opportunities when they deliver to us and demonstrates the strong global reputation for the quality of South Australian grain from the Viterra network.
“Our team works hard right across our network to load vessels quickly and provide a flexible service to our buyer customers, while also efficiently managing grower receivals.”
Grower deliveries into the Viterra network ramped up last week as they delivered over 1.3 million tonnes into Viterra sites, taking Viterra’s total receivals to over 2.5 million tonnes for the season. Friday (2 December) was the busiest day so far with 226,000 tonnes received into the Viterra network.