Viterra President and Chief Executive Officer Mayo Schmidt said the Outer Harbor facility will greatly boost the state's international competitiveness in exporting premium grain to the world.

 

"This facility supports Viterra's model of moving essential ingredients from areas of surplus to areas of need around the globe," he said. "By being Panamax-capable, Outer Harbour will deliver considerable savings and largely eliminate the necessity for costly, two port loadings that were necessary when larger ships berth in Adelaide.''

 

Outer Harbour will deliver efficiency gains to shippers and grain marketers will provide the opportunity for those savings to be passed onto growers. Viterra expects Outer Harbour will become the preferred grain export facility for all grain on the eastern side of St Vincent's Gulf, said Schmidt.

 

The state-of-the-art deep sea grain terminal at Outer Harbour was initiated by ABB Grain in late 2006. The berth is capable of fully loading Panamax size vessels (50,000 to 70,000 deadweight tonnes) and part-load Cape size ships (70,000 to 120,000 dwt).

 

It features automated grain sampling on arrival and automated ticket scanning and card readers for arriving trucks and rail wagons. The terminal is encircled by a 3.5 kilometre rail line that enables continuous unloading of grain from country grain receival sites at up to 2,400 tonnes an hour. Grain can also be delivered by road to vessel at 800 tonnes an hour.