June 22, 2021
Bega Cheese’s Kingaroy peanut processing plant has received the biggest intake of peanuts for five years.
The harvest finished recently, with crop coming in from the South Burnett, Coalstoun Lakes, Bundaberg and North Queensland.
The total intake was in excess of 15,000 tonnes.
Grower Services manager Tobin Cherry told southburnett.com.au the majority of the peanuts had come from North Queensland and Childers / Bundaberg, with the South Burnett and Coalstoun Lakes making up about 20 per cent.
“It is unfortunate the weather has let us down again in the South Burnett,” Tobin said.
“But Coalstoun Lakes has been able to record very good results. That gives South Burnett growers optimism about what they can achieve given adequate rainfall.”
A dryland peanut variety, Kairi, did very well at Coalstoun Lakes while Menzies was successful in North Queensland, and Alloway and Holt in the Bundaberg region.
Tobin said the early-maturing variety Taabinga had also performed well.
He said growers could also look forward to a couple of new varieties in the pipeline which looked good, with shorter growing times and good quality characteristics.
Bega uses its Queensland peanuts, processed in Kingaroy, in its Simply Nuts brand, a natural peanut butter made using 100 per cent Australian nuts.
“We’re thrilled that we’ve had a strong number of growers who hadn’t grown peanuts for the last five years returning to growing, as well as new growers starting to grow peanuts in regions like North Queensland,” Bega Foods executive general manager Adam McNamara said.
“We look forward to these numbers continuing to grow as we look towards planting from September onwards.”
(Photo: Bega)
