Hay exporter Al Dahra Australia’s facility at Wannamal, 100km north of Perth, WA.

GLOBAL feed stocks provider, Al Dahra Australia, will invest $10 million in a hi-tech production line and press at its Western Australian hay processing facility at Wannamal, 100 kilometres north of Perth.

The South Australian manufactured Schutz hay processing plant system will produce 80,000 tonnes per annum of high quality export hay and straw for Al Dahra’s global markets, including the Middle East, Japan, China, Taiwan and Korea.

Al Dahra general manager, Keith Coakley, said the plant would operate from December.

“The new plant will triple our capacity and lift packaging quality to the highest possible level, giving our valued customers more options in terms of bale size and packing and wrapping styles,” he said.

“This expansion of Al Dahra’s initial 2016 footprint in Western Australia signals our intent to build bigger, better and more sustainable business relationships with more growers and to grow market share, potentially via strategic acquisitions, subject to due diligence stacking up.

“With our focus on quality and a commitment to supply only a world class, quality assured product to our customers, we rely on a select pool of equally committed WA growers, who we regard as some of the best in the world.

“We anticipate 2020 will again see excellent returns for growers, with strong demand for hay and straw to meet an increasing need for highly nutritious livestock feed to meet the world’s expanding protein requirements.

“Exporters have very little carryover stocks from last year, which featured low yields but high quality.”

Al Dahra Australia’s new plant at Wannamal will be able to deliver a range of bale sizes and packing and wrapping styles for its export customers.

What is Al Dahra

Al Dahra is a United Arab Emerites-based company that specialises in the cultivation, production and trading of animal feed and essential food commodities and end-to-end supply chain management.

The business has a big geographic footprint, with a workforce of 5000 in more than 20 countries and catering to more than 45 markets, with a leading position in Asia and the Middle East.

The group manages and operates a land bank in excess of 160,000 hectares, with 1200 pivots.

In addition, the company owns and manages 15 forage processing and baling facilities and can produce and supply three million tonnes of alfalfa and grasses annually.

It also focuses on the production, packaging, marketing and distribution of grains, operating three rice mills and two flour mills, with the capacity to annually produce 500,000 tonnes of rice and 500,000 tonnes of flour.

Al Dahra owns and operates a grains hub, strategically located at the Fujairah port in the United Arab Emirate (UAE), with 20 silos and a storage capacity of more than 300,000 tonnes.

It also has investments in the logistics and supply chain sector, moving about two million tonnes annually and shipping 175,000, 20-foot containers.

In 2019 Al Dahra’s share of the global fodder trade was 16 per cent. By the end of 2020 it anticipates growing that share to 20pc.

Source: Al Dahra