Having recently celebrating its 100th anniversary, mixed cropping business Moira Farming has found its perfect balance of growing fresh produce and cotton
As a fifth-generation farmer living on a rural property all his life, Mitch Brimblecombe was destined to take over the reins of his family’s operation – Moira Farming.
The family-owned and operated mixed cropping farm resides in Queensland’s Lockyer Valley, which is affectionally known as Australia’s salad bowl, due to the significant amount of fresh produce grown in the area.
Moira Farming is no different, growing various vegetables including red, white and brown onions, carrots, green beans, sweetcorn, beetroot varieties, and pumpkin. Its point of difference, however, is that it also grows cotton.
Now as the farm manager for Moira Farming and as the fourth generation of his family to work on the current acreage – and the fifth generation overall – Brimblecombe says growing cotton has become integral for the family’s operation.
“Our farm has got a lot of salty bore water, so we’re quite dependent on freshwater dams to irrigate our vegetables,” he says.
“When we faced drought and the dams were empty, we needed another growing option, so we looked back in our history for solutions.
“My grandpa successfully grew cotton many years ago before it was genetically modified but phased out of it because of the amount of spraying that was needed to combat Heliothis and other pests – it wasn’t economical.
“When cotton became genetically modified so Heliothis would die if they ate it, we decided to give it another crack.”
Safe investment
Having originated as a horticultural grower, Brimblecombe says Moira Farming’s cotton has grown to take up around 70 per cent of its 2,200 acres.
While not a lot of the land is used to grow veggies anymore, they are still a significant source of revenue for Moira Farming – making up approximately 50 per cent of its turnover. Brimblecombe says this is because vegetables have a lot higher turnover per hectare compared to cotton.
However, one of the issues the business has been dealing with is the daily price fluctuations of vegetables.
“They can be worth something today and nothing tomorrow and it’s also very domestic orientated unless you’ve got some decent export markets,” Brimblecombe says.
“This is not an issue with cotton, as it is a globally traded commodity.”
He adds cotton is also less labour intensive than growing vegetables, with the bonus of being able to sell in advance without worrying it will perish, making it a safer growing investment.
“If you cut some lettuce or broccoli, the next day it’s got to be packed and delivered, but cotton can sit in the farm or a shed and offers more flexibility,” he says.
“Cotton has given us another growing option – we’ve really enjoyed it, and it’s worked quite well for us.”
Now that Moira Farming doesn’t have to combat pests like it once did, Brimblecombe says it has made growing cotton much easier.
“The genetic technology is very impressive in cotton, and it’s really revolutionised the industry – we don’t even notice the difference anymore,” he says.
Land lease
Vegetables are obviously still a large part of the farming operation – given the 50 per cent turnover –and while the market can be volatile, Brimblecombe says he still very much enjoys growing them.
Compared to other horticultural farming businesses though, Moira Farming doesn’t encompass a packing shed, with Brimblecombe emphasising the business is a grower for vegetable farming suppliers.
“Being a grower really suits us compared to having to constantly supply and plant half an acre a week or twice a week,” he says.
“That doesn’t really suit our farm or our system.”
A small workforce of around eight on-farm staff is in every day, with harvest periods often requiring casual and backpacker labour.
Of the 2,200 acres of farmland, only 1,200 are owned by Moira Farming, with the rest being leased from other farms – a deliberate approach to its growing strategy.
Since the area is prone to flooding, Brimblecombe says many other growers don’t want to take the risk of growing vegetables.
This presented the opportunity for Moira Farming to lease marginal fields and grow cotton instead, even if it gets flooded.
“You’re not going to pay big money and put veggies there, but you can pay a little bit less and grow cotton,” Brimblecombe says.
“Some of our marginal blocks got flooded earlier in the year, but we were still able to pick some of that cotton. There’ll be a 20 or 30 per cent yield penalty, but we will still pick it.
“We know that they will get flooded again but we’re happy to take a punt on them based on the low lease price.”
Although Moira Farming’s salty bore water can be pain, the business has found it to be handy irrigating the cotton, only if it doesn’t touch the leaves.
On the other hand, vegetables aren’t tolerant to this, so Moira Farming has strategically built freshwater dams.
Two separate 900-megalitre capacity dams are used to pump water to four different smaller 20-megalitre pressure dams on-farm, enabling Moira to irrigate different sections of the farm at the same time.
Proud history
2025 marks the 100th anniversary of Moira Farming, and the family business recently celebrated in style.
A large party was thrown, with it being the perfect occasion to uncover some of the business’ hidden machinery gems which had been locked away for many years.
“We got some of the old tractors out and restored them, including a John Deere that is on show now,” Brimblecombe says.
“Having been here for 100 years – that was quite exciting for us as a family.
“While there’s not huge upside potential on cotton compared to horticulture, we’ve found a real happy spot at the moment for our business, our staff and our machinery, and we aim to keep making it work.”
Farms & Farm Machinery visited Moira Farming in an on-farm tour that formed part of this year’s Hort Connections exhibition in Brisbane in June.
