Hi Daniel, I’ve been looking at TH-cam (as usual) AMS have been trialling tree shaking as part of the harvest process, are they still doing it and is there farms still using this harvesting method. My take on it is that it will shorten the orchard/tree harvesting time, but my concern is that the harvest will contain many immature nuts which wouldn’t be good for the bottom line, I would imagine. Might be a presentation in this for one of your programs. Cheers Ron HOLBROW
Hi Ron! I admit, it's a hole in my coverage of issues, and one I'd like to fill. The problem is getting actual footage of it. Very few farmers use them in NSW - they're more a large volume Queensland thing. But maybe I'll do one regardless... the concern you raise is one issue, but there are others too. Thanks for the suggestion.
When the price are low the Nis to China prices offer are higher has the price rises the prices offer get more even a cross the process. So maybe a higher farm get price is better all around. Need to be at a fix price also.
Thanks Christopher. I have a big issue with notional pricing. Surely the farmer faces enough risks without also having to buffer the risk of who he sells his crop to.
70% of Australian Macadamias are exported. I don't think the home market was short of Kernel, the export market was, but what did they expect at $1.50/kg? We were losing market share in our primary kernel buyers ( S Korean, Japan, Taiwan) before 2023.We abandoned Europe and USA, largely because of timezones, and a calve up ( behind closed doors) that gifted premium markets to Africa. Think WMO, who we still support via a processor levy that I assume is passed back to growers via a slightly lower price. SA farm gate prices were considerably better (30%) in 2023 and 2022, and they were above ours in previous years. Why? Do they just market it better than us ( or are our processors overheads far higher?) SA is predominantly Beaumont variety.As I understand it, this is a somewhat crinkled shell, average size, middle road kernel variety that grows well in SA. I guess having majority variety gives a more consistent product than our 10+ Hawaiian, 6 or so A varieties and the named ones. We're still losing money at $3.00. The processors are not. If they want growers, they need a plan because just asking us to lose money to support long-term kernel is insane. When will it end? I'm happy to support kernel if they have a plan. Are they branding product. Do they have control over sales organisation. What is their point of difference to kernel buyers. What are they doing to address inefficient processing.??? We should know because growers pay for everything- in the end. Not only are growers being asked to take a haircut to support kernel, they also have to wait up to 14 months for their money. I appreciate that they have to wait for their money, But, as you correctly pointed out, we have weekly labour and monthly input bills, including servicing debt at 7%. It's outrageous that normal business terms are EOM and our cash inflow is on the drip. If processors want to borrow money from growers, that's fine, so long as they pay market rate interest on it. I do understand that if you supply SGM or the 'tent' and are a shareholder you might see a dividend. But the dividend is only paid if they run an efficient operation, you'll still pay interest on the free loan because your bank is not a charity. It's not easy being a processor, and we have no real route to market without them, so we need to be careful. To be clear I want to work with processors. However I think we growers need to be consistent and united in our requests that they become more transparent in business and share their vision for the future.
Ian, many fine points in what you've said. The price is still really too low for any wriggle room to take an even lower offer to support processors whose terms are hardly friendly to work with. But I do worry about how we're supposed to compete if the Chinese NIS operation corners the market, kills off any competition and leaves us worse off than we are now. Not sure there's an answer, yet.
It would be a serious mistake to rely on a _single destination_ export market, no matter how tempting the prices look at first glance... because they _won't_ last. When the local processors disappear, so will the favourable prices from China. They may even buy up the processing plant and ship it back to China (just like they did with rare earth mineral processing, turning that into an effective monopoly). Chinese consumers may prefer their nuts in shell, but that doesn't mean they won't _happily_ sell Australian nuts back to Australia (just as they do with seafood).
The dangers all seem there Damon. It's true that China loves our macas, but the real truth is that China just loves nuts of all kinds. The massive increase in NIS export to China partly reflects that macadamias became cheaper than almonds and out-competed them. Which sounds OK, until you remind yourself that the price was less than the cost of our production and we could never compete with almond production costs anyway.
I think your co-op guy you talked about has the right idea, start selling direct to whomever and cut-out the processors for the time being. That will force the local processors to be more friendly to the farmers. Perhaps that is whats needed for the Aussie Mac farmers.
It might be part of the answer Ron. I still think the AMS needs to be a grower society though. Housing the processors under the same umbrella protects them from criticism over a lot of unfair conditions... notional prices, delayed payment schemes, penalties that seem more like traps.. there's just no advocacy at all.
Hi Daniel, have the weeds been bad for you this year? The farm at modanville next to the school, the trees there haven’t grown in the 15years I have regularly been driving past, that brown soil looks familiar.
I'm not sure whether it's the same one, but the trees didn't seem super healthy. I'd never shown Modanville on the channel before, though, so a minor point of interest. The weeds are thick in the wetter areas but not tall. It's not chickweed, thank God. Chickweed is the enemy of all macadamia harvesters!
Hi Daniel, I’ve been looking at TH-cam (as usual) AMS have been trialling tree shaking as part of the harvest process, are they still doing it and is there farms still using this harvesting method.
My take on it is that it will shorten the orchard/tree harvesting time, but my concern is that the harvest will contain many immature nuts which wouldn’t be good for the bottom line, I would imagine. Might be a presentation in this for one of your programs.
Cheers Ron HOLBROW
Hi Ron! I admit, it's a hole in my coverage of issues, and one I'd like to fill. The problem is getting actual footage of it. Very few farmers use them in NSW - they're more a large volume Queensland thing. But maybe I'll do one regardless... the concern you raise is one issue, but there are others too. Thanks for the suggestion.
When the price are low the Nis to China prices offer are higher has the price rises the prices offer get more even a cross the process. So maybe a higher farm get price is better all around. Need to be at a fix price also.
Thanks Christopher. I have a big issue with notional pricing. Surely the farmer faces enough risks without also having to buffer the risk of who he sells his crop to.
70% of Australian Macadamias are exported. I don't think the home market was short of Kernel, the export market was, but what did they expect at $1.50/kg? We were losing market share in our primary kernel buyers ( S Korean, Japan, Taiwan) before 2023.We abandoned Europe and USA, largely because of timezones, and a calve up ( behind closed doors) that gifted premium markets to Africa. Think WMO, who we still support via a processor levy that I assume is passed back to growers via a slightly lower price.
SA farm gate prices were considerably better (30%) in 2023 and 2022, and they were above ours in previous years.
Why? Do they just market it better than us ( or are our processors overheads far higher?) SA is predominantly Beaumont variety.As I understand it, this is a somewhat crinkled shell, average size, middle road kernel variety that grows well in SA. I guess having majority variety gives a more consistent product than our 10+ Hawaiian, 6 or so A varieties and the named ones.
We're still losing money at $3.00. The processors are not. If they want growers, they need a plan because just asking us to lose money to support long-term kernel is insane. When will it end?
I'm happy to support kernel if they have a plan. Are they branding product. Do they have control over sales organisation. What is their point of difference to kernel buyers. What are they doing to address inefficient processing.???
We should know because growers pay for everything- in the end.
Not only are growers being asked to take a haircut to support kernel, they also have to wait up to 14 months for their money. I appreciate that they have to wait for their money, But, as you correctly pointed out, we have weekly labour and monthly input bills, including servicing debt at 7%. It's outrageous that normal business terms are EOM and our cash inflow is on the drip. If processors want to borrow money from growers, that's fine, so long as they pay market rate interest on it. I do understand that if you supply SGM or the 'tent' and are a shareholder you might see a dividend. But the dividend is only paid if they run an efficient operation, you'll still pay interest on the free loan because your bank is not a charity.
It's not easy being a processor, and we have no real route to market without them, so we need to be careful. To be clear I want to work with processors. However I think we growers need to be consistent and united in our requests that they become more transparent in business and share their vision for the future.
Ian, many fine points in what you've said. The price is still really too low for any wriggle room to take an even lower offer to support processors whose terms are hardly friendly to work with. But I do worry about how we're supposed to compete if the Chinese NIS operation corners the market, kills off any competition and leaves us worse off than we are now. Not sure there's an answer, yet.
Sh!t it sounds grim being a grower when put in those terms.
It would be a serious mistake to rely on a _single destination_ export market, no matter how tempting the prices look at first glance... because they _won't_ last. When the local processors disappear, so will the favourable prices from China. They may even buy up the processing plant and ship it back to China (just like they did with rare earth mineral processing, turning that into an effective monopoly). Chinese consumers may prefer their nuts in shell, but that doesn't mean they won't _happily_ sell Australian nuts back to Australia (just as they do with seafood).
The dangers all seem there Damon. It's true that China loves our macas, but the real truth is that China just loves nuts of all kinds. The massive increase in NIS export to China partly reflects that macadamias became cheaper than almonds and out-competed them. Which sounds OK, until you remind yourself that the price was less than the cost of our production and we could never compete with almond production costs anyway.
I think your co-op guy you talked about has the right idea, start selling direct to whomever and cut-out the processors for the time being. That will force the local processors to be more friendly to the farmers. Perhaps that is whats needed for the Aussie Mac farmers.
It might be part of the answer Ron. I still think the AMS needs to be a grower society though. Housing the processors under the same umbrella protects them from criticism over a lot of unfair conditions... notional prices, delayed payment schemes, penalties that seem more like traps.. there's just no advocacy at all.
Hi Daniel, have the weeds been bad for you this year?
The farm at modanville next to the school, the trees there haven’t grown in the 15years I have regularly been driving past, that brown soil looks familiar.
I'm not sure whether it's the same one, but the trees didn't seem super healthy. I'd never shown Modanville on the channel before, though, so a minor point of interest.
The weeds are thick in the wetter areas but not tall. It's not chickweed, thank God. Chickweed is the enemy of all macadamia harvesters!
@@nutkinfarm kidney weed and farmers friends are out of control here.
The trees look fine to me.
Is it time Nutkin puts in a A203?
@@mattikelby5571 next time I come to do gaps, my short list is 849 and A203. Maybe a few more Ps too.