CBH Group celebrates 100 years in a new book called ‘The Fourth Quarter: The Grain Journey Continues’

A new book celebrating a century of selling and marketing the State’s grain to the world has been unveiled with its authors saying they learnt more about the “incredible” industry than they ever could have imagined. The Fourth Quarter: The Grain Journey Continues was unveiled to CBH staff at a special morning tea on January 12, with the business’ chief marketing and trading officer Jason Craig saying it captured the long and proud history of grain marketing in WA. The book celebrates 100 years of CBH Group’s marketing and trading division, which was known as The Grain Pool of Western Australia until 2002 when it merged with CBH Group. The book is a sequel to another publication called The Grain Journey, which documented the first 75 years of The Grain Pool of WA and was released by author Michael Zekulich in 1997. A scanned reproduction of The Grain Journey is included inside The Fourth Quarter, making it a complete two-book set. The Fourth Quarter: The Grain Journey Continues was created by Peter E Ramshaw and Dr Katja Lee, after Ramshaw was commissioned by CBH to write the most recent 25 years of history. “This book captures and preserves the incredibly rich legacy of what is now CBH marketing and trading,” Mr Craig said. “It is a story that needs to be told, to celebrate the people who got us here, and to fully appreciate how we came to be Australia’s largest grain exporter. “The book rides the many triumphs and tribulations of the organisation and the WA grain industry, capturing the evolution of CBH marketing and trading over 100 years.” WA’s lucrative grains industry has gone through significant changes during the past 25 years, including the controversial deregulation of barley, lupins and canola in 2003, and then wheat in 2008. “At the time, we thought it was going to be a disaster for the company … but instead we have flourished,” Mr Craig said. “Since wheat was deregulated, this company has gone from trading 2Mt in the 2000s to trading and exporting nearly 10Mt last year. “ Mr Craig said other notable changes included a “move to pooling and cash pricing”, surviving global financial crises, China’s anti-dumping tariffs and a rising increase in sustainability leading to the creation of a “sustainable canola market” in Europe. “We have had a lot of CEOs and leaders and they have had a lot of foresight and commitment during the past 100 years,” he said. “We have been through wars, changes in political and regulatory environments — both domestically and internationally — financial crises and of course the development of new crop types.” Ramshaw said his appreciation for the “imagination, tenacity and foresight” of The Grain Pool and marketing and trading employees had grown in line with the pages of the book. “It has morphed into an amazing story of success and forward thinking, and celebrates how central this organisation is to WA agriculture,” he said. Originally from the Wheatbelt, Ramshaw was a “townie” who spent his childhood in Kellerberrin and his teenage years working for CBH and helping with harvesting of family friends’ crops. He was then a photographer at The West Australian and later worked for politicians in various roles. Primarily a fiction author, Ramshaw jumped at the opportunity to write a historical publication. After engaging Dr Lee as a researcher, he took the 500-plus pages of notes she compiled over six weeks and started to put words together to detail the journey in chronological order. “We looked at what the big challenges were and how they were overcome,” he said. “Along the way, I gained an appreciation of how pervasive CBH and the Grain Pool are in the country; their reach is far greater than I imagined from employing so many people, not just during harvest but during the whole year. “The company is also generous with donations and grants to communities … there are hundreds of millions of dollars that are injected back into country areas. “I didn’t realise they were such a big part of rural WA.” Dr Lee, who is a lecturer at the University of WA, spent six weeks delving through newspapers, websites, annual reports and other parts of CBH Group’s history to compile more than 500 pages of notes for Mr Ramshaw. “One of my favourite parts of the process was reading copies of Countryman, and I would ask the librarians to pull out boxes of editions for me to read,” she said. “I have a new appreciation for farmers; there is always something happening and there are always obstacles to overcome. “The debates, tragedies, personalities, weather patterns and even pests were the traces of a vibrant past.” It’s a big responsibility putting together such an account, but Ramshaw said he was proud of the final product. A challenge creating the book was that prior to the 1970s, CBH would keep a “Hansard-like” account of board meeting minutes. “From about 1970 onwards, the minutes just take the form of ‘we had a long discussion and we decided to do this’, so it was harder to get an insight into the minds of people,” Ramshaw said. “There is so much intrigue … and so much went on in those 25 years, through the global crises that went on in that timeframe. It was turmoil after turmoil. “I was surprised the company survived; you have bushfires and droughts and the company seems to get stronger and I think that is down to the hard-headedness of the farmers and directors.” Wongan Hills farmer Robert Sewell — who served as a director of CBH and The Grain Pool of WA between 1978 and 2005 — said the book would be an important reference tool for many years to come. “So often people wish they had recorded the history of their organisation,” he said. “Well, we can hold our head up high because the WA grain industry has done it.” The Fourth Quarter: The Grain Journey Continues will be available at CBH events throughout the year, including the CBH AGM and Member Forum at Optus Stadium on February 17, and the CBH Regional Member Forums in August. An ebook is available at cbhgroup.co/TheGrainJourneyContinues. To request a hard copy, email corporateaffairs@cbh.com.au. A BRIEF HISTORY On March 21, 1922 the first formal meeting of the inaugural trustees of the then Voluntary Co-operative Wheat Pool of Western Australia, or The Wheat Pool, was held in Perth. Less than six months later, nearly 85 per cent of WA growers had pledged all of their grain to The Wheat Pool. A further 10 per cent pledged more than half. In 1961, The Wheat Pool was renamed to The Grain Pool of WA, to reflect its increasingly diverse portfolio of wheat, barley, oats, and later, lupins and canola. The Grain Pool merged with CBH in 2002, a move that integrated marketing, storage and handling to return value to WA growers. CBH marketing and trading is now Australia’s biggest grain exporter with more than 200 customers in 30 countries.