The Sugar Industry Tribunal has defended its decision to write off more than $181,000 in receivables linked to a discontinued cane quality initiative.
This was revealed at a hearing before the Standing Committee on Public Accounts during the committee’s review of the 2021-2022 Audit Report on statutory authorities.
Tribunal registrar Timothy Brown said the funds were tied to the Near Infrared Reflect (NIR) system, a pilot project trialled from 2014 to 2016 that aimed to pay cane farmers based on cane quality. However, despite a $4million investment from the Government, the project never advanced beyond the trial stage.
“It’s not a collection – what happened was, it was just a posting error,” Mr Brown told the committee.
“People didn’t post it into the correct account.”
He said an independent consultant advised the tribunal that, because of the project’s closure, the receivables could not be recovered and should therefore be written off.
Mr Brown also acknowledged ongoing challenges in managing the tribunal’s limited financial and human resources.
“We struggled, honestly. It’s not that we didn’t want to do the work, we really struggled,” he said.
