By Daryl Turner

 

The recent development of the La Nina weather pattern over Australia, which usually delivers above average rainfall across our summer months, has strengthened in the past month. This has lead to cooler, wetter weather in recent months across the eastern half of Australia and is having a direct impact on delays of our upcoming harvest in Southern Australia. We anticipate this will have flow on effects of delays through cleaning sheds and final product availability.

 

On the positive side we are forecasting yields to be strong across our portfolio of products with average to above average performance due to the cooler wetter spring conditions.

Alfalfa crops are currently being locked up for seed set and will require some sunshine and heat units to trigger consistent flowering and pod set as we head into the summer months.

 

Tropical seed production sowing is in full swing with dryland soil conditions providing a good seed bed for planting. Some crops have been re-sown due to flooding and heavy rainfall.

 

We are facing a few challenges as we head into 2022 with Australian growers experiencing large increases of farm inputs such as; nitrogen based fertilisers, irrigation costs, fuel and crop chemicals. Record prices for beef and strong lamb pricing is contributing to a strong increase of rural land values, this is putting pressure on seed production pricing to compete with other commodities for land use.