WINTER cropping farmers didn’t receive the finish they were hoping for yet harvest is shaping up to be the best in three years.
The 2015 National Crop Update tips yield to be the best in three years and pockets of southern NSW and the Riverina are looking good.
Warwick Holding of “Glenlynn” at Yerong Creek will harvest his own winter crop plus complete contract harvest jobs throughout the Riverina.
This week he was windrowing canola near Lockhart.
He said the crop was looking better than expected and harvest would likely run on time.
“Canola crops are generally quite good considering the end to the season … the rain stopped and there was a month in there virtually without rain,” he said.
“The canola was going on soil moisture from the winter.”
Mr Holding welcomed the news that harvest was tipped to be better than expected.
However, he remained cautiously optimistic given the fact that there were parts of southern NSW which were not doing as well as others.
“This is certainly not the finish we were expecting or hoping for back at the end of August,” he said.
Farmers in southern NSW are expecting up to 25mm of rain this weekend.
And Mr Holding said the rain wouldn’t affect windrowing and might, in fact, be of benefit for some of the wheat crops depending on what stage they are at.
Rural Bank senior relationship manager for NSW and Queensland, John Ellwood said it had been a year of extremes for the grain industry.
He said overall national grain production was expected to be higher than last year.
This was due to an increase in the production of legume crops, with wheat production forecast to grow by three percent and barley by 12 percent, while canola production is predicted to fall by 14 percent.
“Despite a dry start, growing season rainfall has been close to average for most of the state, although the October to December harvest period is likely to be drier than normal in south-east NSW,” he said.
“One more finishing rain is necessary if better than average (wheat) yields are to be achieved,” he said.
He said the Chinese grain export value dropped from approximately $2.4bn to $1.9bn annually.
NSW wheat exports to Indonesia improved year-on-year in 2014/15, reflecting the national increase in grains being exported to the country, with the total reported export value increasing from around $1.2 billion in 2012/13 to $1.4 billion in 2014/15.
