Award-winning agriculture network Viterra’s 2023/24 harvest is officially underway with the company receiving its first delivery of wheat at its Thevenard site yesterday.
Charra grower Jesse Chandler, who made the first delivery says he is hopeful for a good season.
“It’s always great to make a start to harvest after everything that goes into producing a crop. It’s exciting to get into harvest and be Viterra’s first load for the state,” Jesse says.
“Although we’ve started earlier than normal and yields are down a little, quality is good with H1 on our first load.
“We would’ve liked a little more rain this year to get yields up a bit, but we’ll take what we can get.”
Harvest has also kicked off in Viterra’s Central region with a load of barley received at Viterra’s Port Pirie site yesterday afternoon.
Viterra General Manager Operations, Gavin Cavanagh says Viterra is looking forward to supporting local growers when they start harvesting.
“We’re well positioned to work with our grower customers to safely and efficiently receive their new season crops, provide a high-level of service, and export their grain to international markets,” Gavin says.
“Pending favourable conditions, we are predicting South Australian growers could produce between 9 – 10 million tonnes for the 2023/24 season, but we’d love to see more rain in the later areas for local growers.
“We work closely with our grower customers in the lead up to harvest to understand what they are growing and ensure our service offering, including opening hours and segregations, matches their needs.”
As part of its harvest preparations, Viterra has invested over $60 million on capital expenditure and maintenance across its network.
“Ready for harvest, we have purchased new equipment like drive over hopper stackers and front end loaders and made upgrades to weighbridges and bunkers where it provides the greatest value to our customers,” Gavin says.
Viterra General Manager Supply Chain, Derek Robjohns says domestic and international buyers are eagerly awaiting the increase of harvest deliveries into the Viterra network.
“We have strong demand across all our ports with 6.3 million tonnes of forward shipping booked by 18 exporters, which is great news for our grower customers,” Derek says.
“Heading into a new season with forward bookings provides growers with confidence that buyers are ready to purchase their grain when they deliver it to us.”
Derek says after a record breaking season which saw the company export over 7 million tonnes of 2022/23 season grain to international markets and outturn 1 million domestically, Viterra is in a great position for the new harvest.
“We’ve strategically positioned carryover around our network to facilitate grower and buyer customer requirements, including fulfilling early shipping,” Derek says.
“Due to the excellent reputation of southern Australian grain and quality management and efficiency of the Viterra network, our grower customers have continued access to our 45 buyer customers. We look forward to working with both again this season to connect local grain with global markets.”
With Viterra’s permanent employees and seasonal harvest workers playing a key role in receiving and exporting southern Australian growers grain, Gavin says the company has seen a high level of interest in its annual harvest recruitment campaign.
“Our harvest recruitment campaign this year has been very successful. Our harvest jobs are exciting and rewarding opportunities, and it’s been excellent to see such a strong uptake to fill these roles,” Gavin says.
“Our harvest workers have been undertaking training and inductions and we’ve started welcoming some of our new harvest workers on site. We look forward to more joining us in the coming weeks.
“Together with our 800 permanent employees, our 1500 seasonal workers play an important role in supporting us to safely and efficiently receive growers’ grain and deliver it to end use markets around the world.”