FRUSTRATED by the lack of value-creating opportunities since deregulation and holding hopes of creating direct relationships with end-users, a Mid North grain producer is turning his property into a vertically integrated export business to sell his grain overseas.
Bartyn Dall farms with his parents Trevor and Lynette, wife Diane and kids Harry and Charlie at their 2100-hectare property at Kybunga.
The family enterprise is made up of a mixed-grain rotation cropping wheat, barley, beans and export hay, and to a lesser degree canola, lentils and lupins.
The Dall family also runs sheep and cattle on their property, and own a fabrication business.
Mr Dall has established the Sunset Plains brand as an innovative approach to grain marketing.
"It's reassuring for Asian customers to know that the person sending them the grain is the same person that grew it and packed it," he said.
"I was looking forward to deregulation opening up some real value-adding opportunities with grain producers and export markets becoming more connected.
"But the opposite has happened. We are now more polarised than ever before.
"The current structure - and cost - of the middle-market in Australia has actually suppressed our ability to capture real value on farm."
To vertically integrate his operation, Mr Dall will build an export-accredited container packing facility on-farm with necessary storage and handling equipment for fumigating and cleaning grain.
This will include 1000 tonnes of fully sealed, aerated, and fumigable storage.
Containers will be packed and sealed on-property and returned to the export inter-modal logistics hub at Bowmans, a few kilometres from Woodlands Hill.
Mr Dall says many overseas customers want a closer supply relationship with Australian grain producers and he has already started to meet some of them.
He was under no illusions about the time it takes to develop a relationship with Asian customers but was surprised with how quick responses have been.
The first shipload of Sunset Plains containers are expected to be sent out in late March, most likely to Egypt or Sri Lanka - just two of the countries that have shown strong interest in the concept.
*Full report in Stock Journal, February 21 issue, 2013.
