After seven months of silence, the bellows of cattle and the calls of auctioneers are once again echoing around one of the largest livestock facilities in New South Wales.
The Northern Rivers Livestock Exchange (NRLX) in Casino was closed last year due to a stand-off between agents and its owner Richmond Valley Council.
NRLX has now reopened in time for the upcoming weaner season, with tens of thousands of extra cattle needing to be sold by local producers.
George and Furhmann managing director Darren Perkins said they had no regrets standing their ground over selling agreements.
“This is a very, very good facility, and it was a shame that it was closed for so long,” he said.
“Lismore was a very good operational centre for us.
“At the end of the day, we’ve come in through all the negotiations [and] we’re back here at the Casino saleyards.”
All five agents previously working from the facility returned to the saleyard today for their first combined prime cattle sale, with 2,300 head on offer.
Change in fees
The facility is now being run by Outcross Agri-Services, under a five-year lease.
Speaking for the first time since the takeover, managing director Tom Newsome said the transition had been “incredibly smooth”.
He revealed the agents’ yard fees would change from $1 per head sold to 0.2 per cent on agents’ gross revenue, and that producers’ fees had increased by five per cent.
“When you consider inflation, it’s actually it’s not keeping up with inflation, so there’s no significant difference from a vendor’s perspective,” he said.
The new operator has also introduced pre-sale pen scanning, with a $1.18 fee to be charged per animal.
Mr Newsome said industry was consulted on those changes and going forward an advisory committee will be formed with major stakeholders.
“That will mean each group — vendors, buyers, transporters, agents, people with a commercial interest in what goes on here, will have a forum so they can provide advice and put forward their point of view,” he said.
Buyers, farmers, truckies welcome return
Urbenville livestock carrier Travis Phelps welcomed the move back to Casino.
“The extra cartage, especially for where we are, definitely wasn’t ideal,” he said.
“Producers having to have cattle off the property earlier so that we had enough time to get the cattle down to the saleyards in Lismore, definitely put a lot more stress on everyone.
“Obviously the cost did hit us a little bit — we had to then pass that on to the producer, which obviously adds up for them too because it cost them more and at that time, prices on cattle weren’t overly great, so the producer was feeling it a lot as well.”
Robert Gill from Alexander Downs at Merriwa travelled 800 kilometres to attend the first sale back in Casino.
“We buy a number of cattle out here each week and they’re good cattle and and we’d like to support this area,” he said.
“We’ve got a wholesale meat abattoir that we supply, so we feed them for 70 or 80 days and they’re into the local trade.
“We [also] supply Woolworths with 200 cattle a week, which we’ve been supplying for 39 years.”
‘Good for the town’
While the NRLX gates have reopened, the Lismore Saleyards will remain an important selling facility for many local producers like Peter Hannigan from Numulgi.
But he was happy with the prices paid for the 160 head he sold at the first sale back in Casino.
“It’s got to be good for everybody getting back over there, the place can handle numbers, [and it] makes life a bit easier for the agents,” he said.
“For me it doesn’t make much difference, but I think it’s good for the town there.”
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