ICONIC bush outfitter, R.M. Williams, has teamed with Sydney-based Primary Holdings International in a joint venture that has already started building a network of properties across northern Australia to produce premium-quality branded meat and grain.
They have formed a new private company, R.M. Williams Agricultural Holdings (RMWAH), which will have a heavy but not sole focus on producing organic food and will bring together a pool of commercial, rural and environmental talent to ensure its operations are both profitable and sustainable.
As well as producing crops and livestock, RMWAH plans to grow plantations of the nitrogen-fixing tree, Pongamia pinnata, on its poorer country to produce biofuel (from its seeds) while also reducing the company's carbon footprint and preparing it for the introduction of an emissions trading scheme.
Three stations owned by Primary Holdings - the adjoining Labelle and Welltree stations in the Northern Territory and Mirage Plains on the Warrego River in south-west Queensland - have become the seed properties for the joint venture.
RMWAH has also acquired the large-scale organic poultry business, Inglewood Farms, in south-east Queensland which was developed by Clive and John Wylie.
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