As you may have seen in the news, the major macadamia growing regions of South-East Queensland and Northern New South Wales in Australia have recently experienced a significant rain and flooding event, which has caused widespread damage to communities and farm infrastructure. This event has been particularly devastating in the Lismore area, which experienced its worst flooding event in 130 years.

Coincidently this event has happened less than a week since the Australian Macadamia Society forecast a 6% increase in the Australian crop to 54 930 tonnes (at 3%moisture).

“Whilst it is still too early for us to understand the full impact this rain and flooding event has had on the macadamia crop, there is no doubt some crops have been lost with very significant losses on some farms”, said our CEO, Larry McHugh.  “Our Grower Liaison Officers are in the process of contacting affected Marquis Macadamias growers to understand the impact on their farms and to provide advice and assistance to minimise losses where possible.”

Another rain event is forecast for the North New South Wales area over the weekend, and whilst we all hope that this will not be another big event, it is possible that more damage and crop losses could be experienced.

The Marquis Macadamias processing facilities at Lismore and Bundaberg have fortunately not been directly affected by the flooding. Still, there have been short term disruptions to operations and product movements due either to staff being directly impacted by the floods or access issues in and out of the facilities and to the ports and our domestic customers.

We will contact you again as soon as possible to update you on our own crop intake forecast and the likely impact on the broader Australian crop.

Photo Credit: ABC News