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Guar: The perfect crop for northern Australia?

ABC Rural
Guar growing in northern Australia

A trial crop of guar in northern Australia


It's a crop used globally by the cattle industry, the health food industry and even the mining industry, and now it's being trialled across northern Australia.

It's a legume called guar.

It's grown in India and Pakistan and could be the cash crop northern Australia has been searching for.

The Australian Guar Company (AGC) wants to establish an industry across Australia's north and is doing trials at the moment in north Queensland and the Northern Territory.

The company's national operations manager, Tony Matchett, says a trial crop near Katherine (Northern Territory) has just been harvested and the results were pleasing.

"We planted a small block west of Katherine and it certainly showed some promising signs," he said.

"We've just harvested about 10 tonnes, which was a little bit better than I expected given the (poor wet) season we've had,

"We've learnt a lot about things we need to do in terms of weed management and getting our plant population right, but yeah, the signs have been encouraging from this first trial."

AGC will soon be planting another trial crop in the Northern Territory, but this time in the Douglas Daly region.

It's also trialling the crop near Charters Towers and Georgetown in north Queensland.

Tony Matchett says demand for the crop is huge and his company has plans to grow the crop right across northern Australia.

"We've got plans to grow guar from Townsville, right up through the Gulf and Cape, throughout the Territory, and right across the Kimberley from the Ord to Broome," he said.

"Demand is driving us to get this industry established and commercial as quick as possible,

"We're just ensuring we get the right varieties and growers, because if the growers aren't happy with it, or it's not giving them the returns, then it's not going to work,

"But we're really confident that we're going to have a substantial area growing guar over the next five years with hopefully hundreds of thousands of acres, because that's where the potential is."

The demand and price for guar is rising quickly across the world, because of its use in hydraulic fracturing by oil and gas companies.

Derivatives of guar gum thickens the slurry of water, sand and chemicals pumped into wells during the fracking process, helping to increase viscosity, reduce fluid loss and decrease fluid friction.

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