CBH Group celebrates 10 years since launching its fertiliser arm in a bid to drive down WA fertiliser prices

CBH Group is celebrating a major milestone this month — 10 years since it launched its fertiliser business in WA in a bid to drive down the price of local farmers’ largest input cost. CBH Fertiliser entered the WA market in 2015 with the intention to deliver value to growers through high-quality products at competitive rates. The co-operative aimed to put “millions of dollars” back into the pockets of growers in the process. Head of Fertiliser David Pritchard said the benefits for WA growers had been substantial, with growers seeing fertiliser prices that better reflected international market values. “As we celebrate our 10-year milestone, our product outloads have been consistently higher each month than in our entire first year of operations,” he said. When established, CBH Fertiliser operated from leased collection points in Kwinana and Geraldton offering a conservative range of granular fertiliser products. As demand increased so to did the range of products, storage and outturn capacity at CBH’s fertiliser sheds. In May 2021, the Esperance fertiliser shed was opened and the Kwinana facility was expanded to introduce liquid fertiliser facilities. “In early 2023, the newly inaugurated Kwinana Fertiliser Terminal marked a significant milestone with the first vessel carrying Urea Ammonium Nitrate, and notably the first non-grain vessel, berthed and unloaded at the Kwinana Grain Terminal jetty soon after,” Mr Pritchard said. “Berthing our UAN fertiliser vessels at the Kwinana Grain Terminal leverages our people, existing network and infrastructure which provides increased discharging flexibility instead of the adjacent Fremantle Ports Kwinana Bulk Jetty helping us deliver a competitively priced product.” CBH Fertiliser is part of CBH Group’s Path to 2033 Strategy and aims to provide growers with access to competitively priced bulk fertiliser, encourage a domestic fertiliser market with improved price transparency, and continue building relationships with suppliers and industry experts to ensure access to fertilisers for WA growing conditions.