Early rain and a global shortage of oilseed crops help the West Australian farmers for a $2 billion canola harvest.
According to the farmers, across Australia, they are expected to sow almost 2.9 million hectares of canola, which is more than half of that to be planted in Western Australia.
Most West Australian farmers appreciated strong season-opening rain, enabling them to develop their canola planting area to 1.5 million hectares, as the canola price rose.
Canola is a crop that Grain Industry Association of WA crop report author Michael Lamond said could be worth $2 billion at harvest time.
“It’s just very rare to have an early break with subsoil moisture, and when you have that you have a lot of confidence in that the outcome will be that your yields will be above average,” he said.
“Then when you combine that with the good prices, it’s just a very unusual situation and it’s one that everyone is trying to make the most of.”
Over the past few weeks, when the prices have decreased slightly they remain in a historical setting very high.
“In in 2006 – 07 the price was around $667 per tonne, it peaked at that, in today’s dollar terms that’s about 854, so it’s just under that,” Mr Lamond said.
“So it’s the prices we are getting for canola at the moment are the second-highest ever on record and that has fuelled the extra canola area that has gone in.”
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