Famed tea growers’ WA farm in new hands after sale exceeding $50m

The Esperance farm is controlled by JA Russell (Australia), an entity linked to the family company of British entrepreneur John Archibald Russell, who established tea gardens in Malaysia’s Cameron Highlands in the late 1920s, founding the company now known as Boh Tea. One of Australia’s largest tea producers, Nerada Tea, is owned by Boh Plantations and JA Russell (Guernsey).

The Oaks is now in the hands of a local farming family from the Hopetoun area, for a price that exceeded the guidance given when it hit the market earlier this year.

“The Oaks attracted strong interest from both domestic and international buyers, reflecting the continued demand for high-quality, scalable farming assets in Western Australia,” said Colliers’ Duncan McCulloch who handled the property with his colleagues Rawdon Briggs and Gabi Mewburn, along with AWN Rural’s Rowan Spittle.

The transaction is among the most significant in the Esperance region in recent years. In the neighbouring Great Southern region, one of the biggest farming deals over the past two years was WA property developer Julian Walter’s sale of his mixed-farming operation, Cherylton Farms, for a record $100 million.

That 8554-hectare property was sold on a walk-in, walk-out basis in early 2023 to Excel Farms, a Victorian business led by Nick Paterson and backed by Canadian investor Fiera Comox Partners.

Meanwhile, under the stewardship of the Russell family for more than 50 years, The Oaks went on the market as a mixed farming operation – sheep and cropping. Previously it was mostly a grazing property, but has shifted to a 70-30 split between cropping and pasture. Sheep farmers across the state are preparing for the phasing out of live animal exports to the Middle East by 2028.

“The new owners are excited to continue the transition, undertaken by the Russell family, from a predominantly grazing property to 100 per cent cropping country,” AWN Rural’s Rowan Spittle said.

Considerable investment has been made over the past five years into the property’s soil, machinery and infrastructure.

Its proximity to the coast – less than 20 kilometres away – provides a favourable environment for high-yielding crops, as well as the three river systems that run through the property. Logistically, The Oaks also benefits from its relative closeness to the Esperance port.