MINING billionaire Gina Rinehart has paid around $70 million to expand her already enormous cattle footprint in the New England region, buying the exceptional grazing property Wirribilla.

The purchase was made on the S. Kidman side of Ms Rinehart’s pastoral asset ledger, and now brings S. Kidman (crossbred Wagyu) and Hancock Agriculture (Fullblood 2GR Wagyu)’s footprint in the region to around 42,000ha.

The 5003ha Wirribilla is located 20km south-west of Walcha in a region known as the ‘Pasture Wonderland’, with nearby neighbours including Paraway Pastoral’s Aberbaldie Station.

Thje property will be used primarily for breeding and backgrounding purposes for S. Kidman’s rapidly expanding Kidman Premium F1 Wagyu herd. Most of the resultant progeny will be fed at the nearby Gunnee feedlot near Inverell.

Around 800 Angus breeders were included in the partially-stocked sale, however a large fine-wool Merino sheep flock was sold earlier.

Offered to the market in October by US-based Sam Swire, the property was described as ‘one of the New England’s finest agricultural assets.’

Mr Swire secured the property in 2013 after the family’s UK-based Swire Group announced plans to end 30 years of involvement in Australian agriculture by offloading the expansive Clyde Agriculture – at the time worth an estimated $300 million. The Swire Group held interests in Australia stretching back to the 1960s, including the Frigmobile refrigerated transport business, a shareholding in the Northern Meat Exporters beef plant based in Katherine NT and extensive pastoral assets. It also owned a stake in Cathay Pacific Airways and shipping company, China Navigation (later Swire Shipping) which did extensive refrigerated meat business out of Australia.

From 2010 to 2014, ten properties, spanning more than 270,000ha of prime grazing, cropping and irrigation country in northern New South Wales and Queensland, were progressively sold off.

Boasting a strong history of pasture improvement and fertiliser application, around 4369ha (87 percent) is sown to improved perennial grass and clover pastures in a 900mm average annual rainfall region.

Wirribilla has undulating and open grazing land with mostly red and chocolate basalt soils and some New England traps.

With a history of producing both beef and prime lambs, it is capable of running 73,000 Dry Sheep Equivalents.

Over the past 12 years, Wirribilla has been running a self-replacing composite ewe flock and an Angus herd, together with cattle trading and long term agistment for cattle backgrounding.

Water is secured from five bores, 217 dams, an extensive reticulated water system and frontages to the Macdonald River and several creeks.

Infrastructure includes two homes, six cottages, a fisherman’s hut, three cattle yards, six sheep yards and numerous sheds.

Wirribilla was offered for sale by expressions of interest in November last year. LAWD agents Col Medway and Daniel McCulloch who handled the sale were unable to disclose the buyer or the price paid, however during the marketing campaign it was anticipated to raise around $70m.

Recent Hancock and Kidman purchases

The purchase of Wirribilla follows hot on the heels of another significant land investment in the region. In May, Ms Rinehart’s S. Kidman division (in which she holds a two-thirds stake with Chinese interests) took ownership of the 7000ha Jindabyne Station, 80km north of Inverell, as part of a deal valued at around $36 million, including some cattle.

And in February, Gina Rinehart’s Hancock Agriculture and 2GR Wagyu business outlaid $70m for the 10,000ha Wongaboori Station near Mendooran to grow her central western NSW portfolio.

Other New England holdings

Since 2018, Gina Rinehart has secured around 42,000ha of land in northern New South Wales’ New England region. The properties include:

• 17,800ha Sundown Valley, near Kingstown, west of Armidale – one of NSW’s best known and largest-scale backgrounding and finishing operations. The business also owns another unnamed Kingstown property.
• 1607ha 7000 head Gunnee feedlot near Inverell.
• 3234ha Glendon Park Aggregation (comprising four properties), 40km north-east of Armidale.
• 3900ha Warrabah Station, between Kingstown and Manilla, west of Armidale that neighbours three Lyndhurst holdings spanning 3280ha.