Australia: Transparency review completed for SA barley single desk

The South Australian Barley Single Desk Transparency Committee has concluded its first quarterly review of the 2005/06 South Australian legislated barley pool and found no adverse results, ABB announced on April 18.

The independent review, conducted by auditors Ernst & Young, was undertaken in accordance with Australian Auditing Standards applicable to the procedures agreed upon by the Committee.

In accordance with the agreed post review reporting arrangements the South Australian Barley Single Desk Transparency Committee make the following statement:

Ernst & Young has conducted testing of transactions between ABB Grain Ltd and the legislated South Australian barley pool for the three-month period 1 November 2005 to 31 January 2006 and the Committee is pleased to report the review report contained no adverse findings.

Chair of the South Australian Barley Single Desk Transparency Committee James Rackham, said he was pleased with the openness of the review processes.

“The appropriate governance and accountability structures have been put in place to ensure the independence and integrity of the review,” said Mr Rackham. “And we’re obviously pleased with the outcome of the review which highlighted there were no adverse results.”

ABB Grain Export Ltd chair and member of the South Australian Barley Single Desk Transparency Committee, Trevor Day, said the establishment of the Committee was a positive initiative, which was providing more independent oversight of the legislated barley pool.

“This is one of the transparency measures that have been put in place recently to ensure ABB Grain continues to appropriately manage the single desk for all South Australian growers, which the review shows we have been doing.”

The South Australian Barley Single Desk Transparency Committee was established following talks between ABB Grain Ltd and the SA Farmers’ Federation (SAFF) Grains Council in August 2005. The Committee comprises James Rackham, Chair (SAFF Grains Council member), Garry Hanson (SAFF Grains Council member), and Peter Treloar (Eyre Peninsula grower and former SAFF Grains Council member). The committee also includes three ABB Grain Export Directors who are grain growers from their respective areas, they are: Trevor Day, Paul Daniel and Andrew Barr.

E-malt.com, the global information source for the brewing and malting industry professionals. The bi-weekly E-malt.com Newsletters feature latest industry news, statistics in graphs and tables, world barley and malt prices, and other relevant information. Click here to get full access to E-malt.com. If you are a Castle Malting client, you can get free access to E-malt.com website and publications. Contact us for more information at marketing@castlemalting.com .