Rural
30 January, 2023
Murray Warra farmer says… It’s a great time to be in agriculture
After three successive buoyant broad-acre cropping years in the Wimmera Mallee and what has generally been viewed as a bumper year again, Murra Warra farmer and vice president of the National Farmers Federation, David Jochinke says it’s a great...
After three successive buoyant broad-acre cropping years in the Wimmera Mallee and what has generally been viewed as a bumper year again, Murra Warra farmer and vice president of the National Farmers Federation, David Jochinke says it’s a great time to be in agriculture.
“It’s been a great year in both terms of yield and price,” he says
He says the combination of excellent yielding crops, from well above average Spring rainfall last year, combined with elevated commodity pricing, means this last season has been the highest ‘quartile’ in his farming career, with most farmers running quite profitable operations.
“Of course there’s been some disappointments for some, particularly where high input cost legumes have been inundated for too long and some have lost significant percentages of these crops, but despite this, all-in-all it’s been another good and profitable year,” Mr Johinke said.
“One of the challenges has been effective marketing for our crops, with significant price fluctuations for commodities, but commodity prices have also been up there in the top quartile too. Of course the challenge is knowing when to sell and how to sell.”
“Obviously the headline is to cover all the costs for this year and last year, then you’ve got the taxation management side of things to deal with and making sure you’re balancing taxation out, so unless you’ve bought something, you’ve got nothing to balance that income out with.”
“There’s been an etraordinary investment in a lot more on-farm storage, big new silo’s were running down the roads in every direction across the region, leading up to the bumper harvest,”
“With the industry being quite buoyant, and the instant tax write-off making it financially beneficial to invest in this equipment, most farmers are spending well with rural suppliers and machinery and equipment dealers throughout the region, so there has been a significant and beneficial flow-on to the rest of the industry and the region. It’s great for the local economy,” Mr Johinke says.
“Taxation management is really important, balancing income with investment due to the instant tax right-off finishing, so unless you’ve bought something you’ve got nothing to write that profit off. There’s a lot of things ‘walking out the door’ and I think most people will be looking to tip money into FMD’s (Farm Management Deposits) this year as a hedge for future years which might be leaner.”
When asked if this could be deemed a bumper year, Mr Jochinke doesn’t think so. “I’ve think we’ve seen larger production years…in at least cereal production, pulses and oil seeds could be one of our biggest years…probably a record year, but it’s certainly up there, particularly combined with buoyant commodity prices.”
“There was a lot more canola acreage in this last season, than I’ve seen in a long time and it has produced well, canola needs moisture to finish well and that it has had…to come home.”
“An indication of the year has been the demand for gypsum and the people at Hopetoun and Yaapeet have invested heavily in the mine and the equipment which is a good gauge of the industry…there has been a strong demand for the gypsum for what I believe would be record planting of Canola.”
“The amount of on-farm storage has increased dramatically in recent years. A lot of people are now growing good quality lentils and you have to have on-farm storage to market these well.”
“With land values being so strong and tightly held as well, it shows we’ve had a few good seasons, this had made prices and competition for property high and on the back of that , we’ve hit a new level in land prices, but I don’t see this breaking through this band further, so many farmers will be looking to invest further around their farm or in diversified areas off farm, such as houses, these are discussions we would never have dreamt of ten to twenty years ago,” he said.
“Saying that not everyone has had a great year, I’ve heard of a lot of cereals such as wheat on fallow that have failed due to it being too wet and smashed with disease”.
“Australia wide there’s not a lot of malt barley around and the differential between feed and malt barley has grown quite significantly. Beans have not enjoyed the love as much and have been quite rubbish this year both in yield and price.”
“Hay has also been the real challenge this year too, to get it cured, dried and string around and keeping it in good colour, so a lot of straw has been cut too, vetch was just too hard, there’s a huge market for oaten hay out there, you just can’t get it.”
“There’s been a significant shortage of aerial crop sprayers this year, they just aren’t around anymore, so if you booked them you took it or missed out.”
“It’s been a ‘great time to be’ in ag’, it’s been a hard road and took a long time get here, the sunshine is on our backs at the moment, but that’s the game of farming.”
“We’re kings in grass castles,” Mr Jochinke said.