Queensland Cane Agriculture and Renewables (QCAR) has estimated more than 1.27M tonnes of cane remains unharvested across Australia’s sugarcane mills, resulting in forecast losses to farmers of more than $83M.

QCAR CEO Stephen Ryan said most mills had closed the doors on the 2024 crushing season except for Wilmar Sugar’s Pioneer and Invicta mills in the Burdekin, with Mackay Sugar Limited advising on Sunday it would no longer accept bins at its Marian Mill past 6pm Monday, 13 January.

“This amount of standover cane is unacceptable,” Mr Ryan said.

“It’s exasperating that for numerous seasons now, farmers have paid the price for poor milling performance,” Mr
Ryan said.

“This is so disappointing for growers, and significantly worse considering for some milling regions this is the third and
fourth consecutive year for late finishes and poor mill performance resulting in staggering accumulative costs and losses for our growers.”

Mr Ryan said the impacts, to growers, contractors and millers, from wet weather, mill performance, late starts and finishes and industrial action in Wilmar Sugar mills, would be felt well into 2025.

QCAR Central District Committee Chairman Steve McKeering said Mackay Sugar had noted, that with more widespread rain forecast across the Mackay region and a diminishing supply and quality of cane, it was unviable for
the factory to continue crushing.

“This is disappointing, but it means Mackay Sugar can launch straight into maintenance works and hopefully we can look forward to vastly improved 2025 crush,” Mr McKeering said.

Burdekin grower and Chairman of QCAR Christian Lago said he was just one of many families feeling the pressure of longer seasons, and the wearing effects of having to work through Christmas and New Year in tough and wet conditions.

“You want to have a break, but you can’t,” Mr Lago said.

“You’re tied to the farm just in case there is a window of opportunity to harvest, you want to give yourself every opportunity to get this year’s crop off.

“It’s taken a toll on the whole industry, not only farmers but contractors as well.”

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