To all our growers, welcome to 2023. I trust you have had an enjoyable Christmas, New Year and Lunar New Year. For those of you harvesting crops over the summer months, I hope yields and prices are at the levels you expect and need. For those in Carnarvon preparing for the upcoming planting season, the good news is there are some reductions with input costs now starting to flow through. While these are not back to pre-Covid levels, it appears the worst may be over.

Since our last WA Grower magazine I have been out and about meeting with growers as often as possible. This included a meeting with the new Minister for Agriculture and Food, Forestry and Small Business, the Hon. Jackie Jarvis, and growers at two different locations in Carabooda in late-January. The Minister was keen to hear about industry issues and has committed to another meeting with vegetablesWA to discuss the issues that were raised and other challenges for the industry.

It has been a busy start to the year for us at vegetablesWA, with a packed calendar of events to meet with growers. These included: an Economic Trend Update event in Guilderton on February 28; a Trade Day with Great Northern Rural Ag in Geraldton in early March; the Carnarvon Growers Association (CGA) Field Day in Carnarvon on March 10 and 11; and the Warren District Agricultural Show on March 18. These were great opportunities to meet and talk with growers in these regions.

While talking about events, the big one for the industry in 2023 is Hort Connections in Adelaide from June 5 to 7 (https://hortconnections.com.au/). We have teamed up with AUSVEG to offer a travel subsidy so that we can build a strong WA contingent to jet over for the event. Register your interest with our CEO Stephen Brown prior to March 30 (ceo@vegetableswa.com.au).

The other big one for WA growers is the bi-annual WA Horticulture Updates event to be hosted by DPIRD and held in Perth around mid-October (date and location to be confirmed). With a theme of Tech Available Today, this will be one event not to be missed.

As advised in the previous issue of WA Grower magazine, Truyen Vo has left vegetablesWA. I am pleased to advise that our new Regional Development Officer for Extension Services is Chi Nguyen (0457 457 559). He recently attended the CGA Field Day and looks forward to meeting with more growers and working with you all.

By the time this magazine issue is out on the streets, we will have a new Communications Officer. Anna Flanders (anna.flanders@vegetableswa.com.au) has replaced Ben Hamilton and growers can look forward to a new style of expanded communications as Anna settles in to her new role and brings her wealth of experience to vegetablesWA.

While on staff changes, Michael Bartholomew has left vegetablesWA to expand on his career. We also have a replacement for Michael – Katrina Hill began with us in mid-March. She will continue the excellent work Michael undertook during his time with us. She can be contacted on 0427 373 037.

I encourage everyone to read in detail the Benchmark results released by Bryn and Planfarm in February (see story page 28). These results show up some interesting numbers in relation to income, costs and profit. If you are not part of this project, I highly recommend you contact Bryn and discuss this with him; you will receive invaluable information in relation to the performance of your business.

In closing, I look forward to meeting as many growers as possible over the next three months and throughout 2023.

MORE INFORMATION

Contact Stephen Brown on 0409 448 108 or email ceo@vegetableswa.com.au.

WHAT Hort Connections

WHEN June 5–7, 2023

WHERE Adelaide Convention Centre

HOW vegetablesWA in collaboration with AUSVEG are pleased to offer grower funding to assist WA growers to attend via application by March 30.

TO APPLY Contact vegetablesWA CEO Stephen Brown on 0409 448 108 or email ceo@vegetableswa.com.au.