Calingiri, Mace and Yitpi shine

With harvest now complete and nearly all of the season's 9 million tonnes in the bin, now is a good time to look into the varieties of 2012 to see the winners and the losers.

Once again, Mace and Yitpi performed very well with solid yield and protein numbers.

Both varieties also tended to have less falling number and screenings problems, in comparison to other varieties in 2012.

Magenta was a flop once again, with falling numbers, screenings and protein all creating headaches.

Wyalkatchem remained solid, while tonnes grown were down because of the uptake of Mace.

From a marketing perspective, Calingiri was the winner with noodle premiums trading at $50 above APW2 for most of harvest. The popularity of Calingiri continues to grow, which is surprising considering it was only three years ago that we were told not to grow the variety.

Poor colour and starch properties were a problem for Japanese and Korean buyers, however now it does not seem to be such an issue.

In 2013, I would be surprised if we didn't see crops dominated by Calingiri and Mace, and Yitpi as it looks to replace other underperforming varieties.