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    This Month

    Treasury Wine chief executive Tim Ford has decided to offload four sizeable commercial wine brands - Wolf Blass, Yellowglen, Lindeman’s and Blossom Hill - with drinkers increasingly opting for higher-quality wines.

    Treasury Wine to offload Wolf Blass, Lindeman’s, Yellowglen

    Australia’s biggest wine group will cop a $354m impairment and shop around its cheaper wine brands as part of a strategic reset for the Penfolds owner.

    • Simon Evans
    Elders is using robots to lift and stack wool bales at it new handling centre at Ravenhall in Melbourne.

    Elders makes biggest wool investment in 20 years with robot handlers

    Boss Mark Allison is rolling out the robots as the agribusiness makes a high-tech return to wool handling 185 years after its founders started out in the game.

    • Brad Thompson

    July

    John Setka, former union boss and, now, former redundancy fund director.

    John Setka – finally – leaves Incolink

    No individual is bigger than the union, but Setka thought he was bigger than a CFMEU redundancy fund for a while.

    • Hannah Wootton
    Grain Producers Australia director Andrew Weidemann on his farm at Rupanyup in Victoria.

    Court ruling rejecting weedkiller link to cancer welcomed by farmers

    Federal Court rejects class action linking Australia’s most widely used farm chemical, glyphosate, to non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

    • Brad Thompson
    Wheat being loaded onto a bulk carrier in Geelong. COFCO, a major processor, has been accused of manipulating wheat futures.

    ASIC says Beijing-owned agriculture giant manipulated wheat contracts

    COFCO placed improper trades on the exchange in 2022, improperly affecting the futures’ settlement price, ahead of the Ukraine war, the corporate regulator alleges in court filings.

    • Max Mason
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    Australia Meat Group’s Dandenong facility processes up to 1500 head of cattle a day.

    Global beef players line up for Australian Meat Group

    Street Talk understands Brazilian giants Minerva Foods and Marfrig, and China linked New Hope are getting their ducks in a row.

    • Sarah Thompson, Kanika Sood and Emma Rapaport
    Quintis Group had large plantations of Indian sandalwood trees in WA and the NT but collapsed for the second time in six years.

    End of the road comes in two-decade saga over sandalwood group Quintis

    The company once known as TFS Corporation will be split up and liquidated after KordaMentha failed to find a buyer for the entire business.

    • Simon Evans
    Pernod Ricard’s portfolio includes the iconic Jacob’s Creek brand.

    Pernod Ricard exits Australian wine making, sells to Bain consortium

    The French giant’s portfolio of local brands – as well as those in New Zealand and Spain – will be combined with Accolade Wines, the company behind Hardys.

    • Kylar Loussikian
    The Lyndoch vineyard in the Barossa Valley is being acquired by Seppeltsfield.

    Seppeltsfield buys up as Australian Vintage offloads two vineyards

    The ASX-listed producer behind McGuigan and Tempus Two will exit one property in NSW and sell another in South Australia to its privately owned rival.

    • Kylar Loussikian
    Incitec Pivot CEO Mauro Neves has cut off sale talks with its Indonesian suitor for its fertiliser business.

    Incitec Pivot ditches fertiliser sale talks with Indonesian buyer

    The chemicals giant said it shelved the negotiations due to transaction delays as it flagged a $900 million on-market share buyback would still go ahead.

    • Carrie LaFrenz
    Farmer-controlled CBH is Australia’s biggest exporter of wheat and barley in most years.

    Giant farming co-op looks to exit flour mill partnership with Salim

    Australia’s biggest co-op, farmer-controlled CBH, wants to sell its stake in a network of flour mills in South-East Asia owned with the Indonesian family.

    • Brad Thompson
    AgriProve founder Matthew Warnken: “We’re not going to incrementalise our way out of these challenges, which means that now is the opportunity to innovate.”

    A farming revolution built on down-to-earth thinking

    Increasing carbon levels in grazing lands could remove 10 billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions from the atmosphere says the winner of the Agriculture category.

    • Tom McIlroy
    Cobden dairy farmer Craig Dwyer says the combination of drought, a cold snap, and a 15 per cent cut in farm gate milk prices as of July 1 has hit producers hard.

    ‘No water equals no milk’: big dry, cold snap hit farmers

    Victorian farmers have been hit by a combination of dry and cold conditions as dairy producers also face a 15 per cent cut in farm gate milk prices as of July 1.

    • Gus McCubbing
    Napa Valley.

    Treasury Wine US exec in restraining order row with Napa official

    A restraining order has been filed against Debra Dommen by a Napa Valley politician, Belia Ramos, who says the Treasury exec opposed her re-election.

    • Staff
    Wellard backer Paul  Holmes a Court is one of Australia’s biggest cattle producers.

    Agribusiness sells livestock vessel and share price jumps 117pc

    Paul Holmes à Court-backed Wellard is selling its oldest carrier, the Ocean Ute, in a move that has more than doubled the company’s share price.

    • Brad Thompson
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    June

    AACo says CEO Dave Harris gave a presentation highlighting an “inclusive” workplace.

    AACo admits to sacking whistleblower who sent ‘unsafe’ warning

    The beef giant has meanwhile denied running a “No PC” policy that a former manager had alleged raised safety concerns for young staff.

    • Liam Walsh
    NSW Farmers say cotton growers are concerned about a takeover of Namoi.

    Competition red flags for Olam in battle for Namoi Cotton

    ACCC commissioner Stephen Ridgeway says the bidding war for Namoi Cotton could “all fall over” if rival bidders can’t overcome “serious competition issues”.

    • Brad Thompson
    Treasury Wine Estates CEO Tim Ford at the group’s Magill Estate winery in Adelaide last week after Chinese Premier Li Qiang’s visit to the premises.

    Treasury Wine’s profits buoyed as Penfolds goes all in on China

    Treasury says Penfolds profits will grow 15 per cent this year, but margins will fall as the company spends more rebuilding its export business to China.

    • Updated
    • Simon Evans
    Wine for sale at a store in Shanghai. China lifted punishing tariffs on Australian wine on March 29 this year.

    Chinese backer of Australian wine group nursing big losses

    A Chinese investment group which took a large stake in McGuigan owner Australian Vintage seven years ago is down about $7 million on paper.

    • Simon Evans
     NSW Farmers president Xavier Martin on his farm at Mullaley near Gunnedah.

    GrainCorp looks beyond life as a rainy day stock

    Wet conditions have boosted hopes of another bumper crop. The ASX-listed agribusiness’s share price has been a big beneficiary.

    • Brad Thompson