CREATING workable partnerships has been the secret to the success for Roger and Tim Commins and families who created their incredibly diverse production system at Whitton, in the Murrumbidgee irrigation area.
The brothers were awarded the AgriRisk high achiever of the year award at the close of last week’s cotton conference.
The Commins learned a thing or two from their father George and grandfather of the same name, both of whom managed Kooba Station at a time when broad-scale maize and sweet corn production was intertwined with winter cereals, Corriedale sheep and Hereford cattle.
When the brothers decided to join forces, after independently working in agriculture for more than a decade after university, they purchased a typical Murrumbidgee block of irrigated country 200ha in area and built up their enterprise to produced high-end crops like seed sunflower, seed sorghum, soybeans, maize and sweet corn.
That was in 1989. These days there are another seven farms totalling 1600ha plus another 1200ha west of Darlington Point.
Cotton didn’t arrive in the Murrumbidgee Valley until after the introduction of Monsanto’s Bollgard technology which was a literal ‘game changer’, recalls Roger.
“Before Bollgard it just wasn’t viable to grow cotton in this closely settled district,” he said.
“Back then cotton was sprayed up to 14 times during its season with insecticides. We haven’t sprayed for helicoverpa in the nine years that we’ve been growing cotton.”
Round-up ready cotton also helped make the crop viable in the Murrumbidgee, eliminating chipping labour and the advent of the round bale picker a decade ago also brought efficiencies that played into the hands of Murrumbidgee producers.
Last year the Commins harvested 1500ha of the crop while the district has gone beyond 45,000ha.
Back in 2011, when cotton area was 15,000ha and predicted growth was over 35,000ha the development of a cotton gin became necessary. When no merchant business expressed any interest in such a project the brothers partnered with three local families, gathered the right information and went hard.
The result surprised everyone in the industry.
Diversification key to family operation
Roger and Tim Commins expanded into stainless steel manufacturing during the late 1990s, building a wine storage ‘farm’ on one of their properties and diversifying into manufacture and storage of liquid fertiliser before they took on the biggest project of their lives.
“We could see the potential for a cotton gin in the Murrumbidgee,” recalled Roger.
But none of the local merchants were interested in building one and we couldn’t get support from the banks.
“When we told them we expected to process 200,000 bales in our first year and build the plant in 12 months they told us we were dreaming.”
The critics’ call was fair, given the previous world record cotton gin throughput amounted to 128,000 bales.
“We knew nothing about building a gin but we partnered with the right people.
“We went into partnership with four other families in the district. We built it in 12 months and that first year processed 183,000 bales. Our critics had to eat humble pie and today we help underpin a $300m industry that was one tenth of that five years ago.”
