E-Malt.com News article: Australia: South Australian and Victorian barley growers share in the distribution of top up payments for 2007/2008 barley select pools

Barley growers in South Australia and Victoria will share in the distribution of top up payments for 2007/2008 barley select pools, ABB reported in a press release, April 11.

ABB Grain general manager – marketing, Peter Jones, said the top up of $30/tonne* for the malting No.1 pool and $40/tonne* for the No.1 feed pool would automatically be made to growers in the two states who supported ABB’s traditional and standard select pools.

The top ups bring the total payments to date to $400/t for malting 1 grade barley in the No.1 pool (or 92% of the current standard pool estimated grower return – EGR) and $390/t for feed 1 barley (91% of current standard pool EGR).

In the select No.2 pools, the top ups are $30/t for malting 1 ($355/t to date) and feed 1 grades ($330/t to date) for the standard pool; in the No.3 pools the top ups are $25/t for malting 1 grade ($350/t to date) and $23/t ($295/t to date) for feed 1.

Mr Jones said the pools were still a valuable option for growers in a deregulated market as they were able to take advantage of export and domestic demand. The select pools which were opened ahead of, and closed before, the bulk of the harvest delivered a significant premium for growers when compared to the later-opened harvest pools.

“Although the size of the pools this year was reduced because of the drought, which affected grain production across South Australia and Victoria, ABB was able to maximise pool returns to growers by also tapping into higher domestic values,” he said.

“Flexibility within ABB Grain’s marketing program allowed our company to respond to rapidly changing market conditions due to the deregulation of barley exports in South Australia.”

The above ‘total to date’ figures reflect standard pool advances. Traditional pool ‘total to date’ advances will be lower because anticipated financing costs have already been factored in when the first advance was paid.


11 April, 2008