April 8, 2021
The Department of Agriculture and Fisheries’ trial farm at Redvale looks finally to have reached the end of its life.
The property, on Kingaroy-Barkers Creek Road just outside Kingaroy, has been used as a field site for crop testing by the DPI and then DAF for decades.
It was earmarked for sale back in the years of the Bligh State Government but local protests ensued and its survival was the subject of election promises by the LNP at the 2012 State poll.
Agriculture Minister Mark Furner announced on Thursday the property would be sold to fund the purchase of 53ha adjoining the J Bjelke-Petersen Research Facility on Kingaroy-Cooyar Road.
He said the Kingaroy facility could become a major hub for pigeon pea research.
“The Kingaroy Research Facility with its unique soils and growing conditions, purpose-built infrastructure and agricultural equipment is the ideal location for pigeon pea work,” Mr Furner said.
“The expansion of the site with the 2019 addition of the adjoining land will allow the extended rotations researchers need for even more reliable results.
“This transaction has significant advantages with the additional Kingaroy land being of an identical soil type to that at the existing research facility.
“We’ll have much better water supply security thanks to an on-site bore and creek flows, which will allow the construction of a dam of up to 50 megalitres capacity.”
Mr Furner said pigeon pea was one of the most widely consumed pulses in the world and had “great potential as a summer cash crop”.
