00:00It's all hands on deck for the cotton harvest.
00:05And this season, far north Queensland growers are eyeing their most promising crop.
00:10It's the best season I've ever seen up here for sure, yeah.
00:13It was a pretty wet beginning in the season, but once we started going it turned out to be an unreal season for dry land and irrigated.
00:20After a tough last season, battling excessive rainfall from tropical cyclone jasper, this harvest has helped growers regain confidence.
00:29It's a little bit overwhelming compared to what it was, so it's gone from disaster to, you know, it's incredible.
00:38The cotton industry in far north Queensland is in its infancy, grown in the Atherton Tablelands and further west.
00:44Year on year, growers and agronomists are working together to improve crop outcomes, this season producing nearly double the yield on last.
00:53In favourable weather and re-fertilising some areas and good agronomy and that sort of thing, it bounced back and it's bounced back to an extraordinary, unbelievable situation.
01:05Far north Queensland cotton is transported about a thousand kilometres south to Emerald for processing.
01:11But if things continue on its current trajectory, industry sees potential for a processing facility to be established closer to home.
01:19We just need the area to grow and, you know, and the area is going to grow with a bit more consistent yields.
01:24So the more we get consistent yields, the area is going to grow and then the gene will follow for sure.
01:30Every year, yeah, we'll keep making the same, more improvements and hopefully keep getting that yield up.
01:35With about 2,000 hectares of cotton currently being harvested in the region, growers are planning to plant more cotton into the future.
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