WA’s colonial farmers, who endured crop failures through the 1830s, must have wondered if their European grains could ever succeed in the dry, sandy soil of their newly-cleared farms. To them, it would have been incomprehensible and entirely unbelievable that the grain growers of our wheatbelt would have harvested 22 million tonnes of grain in one year.

Early grain growers could not even feed themselves let alone their community, so the thought that WA could feed other countries as well would be utterly fantastical.

Yet in coming months over 20 million tonnes of WA wheatbelt grain will leave the grain terminals of Geraldton, Kwinana, Albany, and Esperance to feed the people of Indonesia, Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, Japan and South Korea.

Just as WA’s fortunes have always risen and fallen in line with our minerals industry, so must we look to diversify our trade base, both in terms of products and markets, to safeguard our future economic prosperity. In that context, it is heartening that our world-leading dryland agriculture sector is feeding a growing number of South-East and North Asian consumers.

The current COVID-19 global pandemic has brough into sharp relief the interdependence of economies across national boundaries. In Australia, we have been reminded how vulnerable some supply chains are – particularly in early 2020 when medical equipment became scarce. But similarly, in a climate of anxiety about the timely and orderly supply of essentials, Australia’s ability to meet the nutritional needs of our trading partners is a source of stability in our region.

The tremendous success of WA’s grain growers this season not only benefits WA’s farming communities, it also supports Australia’s national interests.

But what happened to transform WA’s grain industry? Simply put, determination, cooperation and investment in science, by successive generations of grain growers.

Our thriving grain industry is dependent on scientific knowledge farming techniques that work in our unique (and changing) environments. Superphosphate fertiliser, and the development of wheat varieties better suited to wheatbelt conditions, addressing trace element deficiencies and the ‘dry-farming’ techniques developed by scientists of the WA State Department of Agriculture and The University of Western Australia have revolutionised yields.

But it was West Australian grain growers themselves that first recognised the value of science and research to their livelihoods and to our State. In 1951, the Wheat Pool of WA donated £10,000 and the WA Flour Millowners Association donated £6,000 to the UWA Institute of Agriculture to pursue lines of agricultural research –well in excess of $700,000 in today’s money.

Indeed, it was the Farmers Union of WA that proposed a voluntary levy of one farthing per bushel on all wheat presented for sale in WA. With encouragement from one of WA’s most revered agricultural scientists, Professor Eric Underwood, (the WA farmer’s greatest friend), the WA Parliament duly supported the idea and the Soil Fertility Research Act was passed in 1954.

A simple yet revolutionary idea that saw the money raised from the levy go to soil fertility research. The wheat farmers of WA went further and convinced producers nation wide to introduce a compulsory levy that would be matched by the Commonwealth.

The old adage that you reap what you sow has never seen a more positive embodiment than the investment – financially and politically – of WA farmers in the development of their own industries.

It is difficult to reconcile the destitution and desperation of early WA grain growers with the fact that today’s growers will send more than 20 million tonnes of grain to international export markets. The tremendous success of the WA grain industry rests on the shoulders of those that built it: successive generations of determined farmers and scientists that worked together cooperatively to pursue the abundant grain sector that we now enjoy.

This opinion piece was first published in the West Australian on Friday, 21 January 2022