QGC has selected Stanbroke to manage its rural property portfolio in the Surat Basin following a tender process that began in December 2014.
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Stanbroke, a family-owned business, will lease about 40 rural properties owned by QGC covering around 70,000 hectares of the Surat Basin.
The company will use QGC’s properties to prepare cattle for their feedlot near Chinchilla.
The announcement has frustrated some landholders involved in what they describe as a long and expensive tender process.
Some have long standing links to QGC and say the company has shown a complete lack of regard for smaller, family run operations by awarding in favour of a large scale operator in Stanbroke.
But QGC managing director Tony Nunan said Stanbroke would run QGC’s properties according to “agricultural best management practices and ensure their long term sustainable use”.
“We have gained an agricultural industry partner who shares our vision for the region and will continue to contribute to the local economy,” he said.
In a statement to Queensland Country Life, QGC said the award of the lease followed a tender process that began with a call for Expressions of Interest in December 2014, followed by a bid process completed in September 2015.
QGC received 43 expressions of interest and 19 bids for the properties.
Miles landholder Bruce Uebergang tendered to retain a lease on QGC country and described the process as a “farce”.
“By awarding these properties to one large operator QGC is confirming their disdain for local employment and community life,” he said.
“The conduct of the tender with QGC was a farce to give the impression of due process. There is a compelling argument to support local operators, especially when they are offering commercially competitive agreements compared to one large conglomerate such as Stanbroke.”
Another landholder who tendered to retain a lease, who did not wish to be named, said he spent more than $9000 on his bid.
“I’ve heard of others who spent more than that because we all sought professional assistance for what we believed was a genuine tender process,” he said.
Tenders were evaluated by an independent agri-economist who then made recommendations to QGC.
In response to questions from Queensland Country Life, a spokesperson for QGC said landholders were notified of the outcome “progressively from mid-September until now”.
The spokesman said QGC was confident that Stanbroke’s bid reflected current market rates.
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