October 7, 2020

By Lynda Kiernan, Global AgInvesting Media

The Darlington Point Aggregation, an irrigated horticulture and row crop operation located in the Riverina region of New South Wales, has been placed on the market with expectations that it will fetch between A$50 million (US$35.6 million) and A$60 million US$42.8 million). 

Agrinova Pty Ltd. has appointed Peter Ryan and Danny Thomas of CBRE to manage the sale, which will be conducted in two phases, with the first seeking non-binding offers by October 30.

Darlington Point is made of four contiguous farms totaling 2,142 hectares (5,293 acres) that have been consistently developed since 2003. These include:

Point Farm – 907 hectares (2,241 acres), Hastings – 408 hectares (1,008 acres), and Cattanach’s – 625 hectares (1,544 acres), which have all been developed and dedicated to irrigated row crop production.

And Wetareel – 202 hectares (499 acres), which is in almond production and has the potential for expansion. 

Situated in a highly production and diverse agricultural region of the country, operations on these farms span a variety of uses.

~ Flood irrigation –  approximately 1,627 hectares
~ Almond plantings – approximately 104 hectares  (net)
~ Developed for almonds, but not planted – approximately 35 hectares
~ Water storages – approximately 32 hectares
~ Dryland and support – approximately 344 hectares

It has also benefited from multiple improvements including the addition of an administrative office, a 460-square-meter workshop and workers quarters, a 950-square-meter machinery shed, a second 294-square-meter machinery shed, and various additional structures. 

“Historically, irrigated cotton has been the major cropping enterprise undertaken at Point Farms, as it had the highest profitability,” said Peter Ryan, who went on to note that Agrinova is open to expressions of interest from buyers interested in deploying the capital needed to fully develop Point Farms, either through a joint venture, sale and leaseback deal, or purchase. 

The irrigation infrastructure of these assets is underpinned by 8,338 megaliters of groundwater, Lower Murrumbidgee Zone 1;  approximately 248 megaliters of General Security entitlement; approximately 3,370 megaliters of annual delivery entitlement, and total on-site water storage capacity exceeding 900 megaliters.

“…with neighboring properties having been developed for horticultural production and the value of water entitlement increasing, Point Farms is ideally suited for an investor seeking to develop the property to its full potential—by either expanding the almond plantings or by establishing other permanent plantings, such as grapes or citrus,” said Ryan.

Climate change, access to secure water, and suitable soil types, have been drivers behind a recent and significant transformation in land use for the region that has seen an expansion in high-value, permanent crop production – most notably, nuts, grapes, and citrus, according to CBRE.

Ryan explained how this represents an opportunity for the buyer to capitalize through land development, saying, “This shift in production focus, and the corresponding increase in the value of land and water entitlements, makes Point Farms ideally suited to an investor seeking to develop the property to its full potential by either expanding the almond plantings or by establishing other permanent plantings, such as grapes or citrus.”

– Lynda Kiernan is editor with GAI Media, and is managing editor and daily contributor for Global AgInvesting’s AgInvesting Weekly News and  Agtech Intel News, and HighQuest Group’s Oilseed & Grain News. She is also a contributor to the GAI Gazette. She can be reached at lkiernan@globalaginvesting.com.