Download (4Mb) - USQ ePrints - University of Southern Queensland

Value Chain
Vision of Sugar Industry for a Sustainable Supply Chain (SRDC, 2006)
• Improvements across the entire value chain on a local region or mill area context.
• Stronger participation from sector participants, leading to a better chance of adoption.
Farming Sector
• Evolution of larger production units (through aggregation, farming cooperatives, or share farming) to
realize economies of scale.
• Development of location-specific farming systems that benefit both the farming sector and the value
chain as a whole.
• Improved yields and more efficient use inputs of water and other inputs, leading to enhanced economic
and environmental performance.
• Improved varieties and better advisory systems for production management. Increased use of
contractors in farming operations.
• Individual negotiated cane supply contracts.
Harvesting and transport Sector
• Better integration of harvesting and transport operations with more effective use of capital.
• Fewer harvesting groups handling much larger tonnages, with longer harvesting hours per day, and
longer seasons.
• Geographical harvesting to capture regional trends.
• Rationalization of sidings and loading pads with more efficient transport systems.
• Improved timely communication of cane yield and cane quality information to growers and harvesters
allowing real-time modifications to operations.
• New payment systems and contracts between miller, grower, and harvester to provide appropriate
incentives to all parties to improve performance.
Milling and marketing sector
• Fewer mills handling larger tonnages of cane and making better use of capital.
• Greater diversity of products derived from sugarcane and cane lands. Production of electricity, ethanol,
and animal feeds will be higher.
• Milling by-products will be utilised more efficiently. Some completely new products such as bioplastics
and biopharmaceuticals will be in early trials.
• The industry will be fully deregulated and this will lead to closer and more direct business
relationships between millers, their suppliers and their various customers.
A key issue will be to define who the Mallee Stakeholders are, now and into the future, their
collective vision, the level of regulation in place, the level of trust between parties and the level of
sharing and planning to date. Stakeholders will include the following Groups:
1. Seedling nurseries and contract tree planters.
2. Farmers.
3. Harvesting contractors, including haulout operators.
4. Road transport operators.
5. Preliminary biomass processors.
6. Biomass conversion industries.
7. Consumers of the products from conversion industries.
8. CRC, university and public sector industry development workers.
9. Private sector industry development individuals and corporations other than farmers.
Current linkages across stakeholder groups are discussed below.
145