Land of opportunity

It was once considered marginal country on the edge of a desert, but Balfour Downs in WA’s Pilbara region is a land of opportunity for modern sustainable development.

Story + Photos Mandy McKeesick

It is the final State of Origin Rugby League match for 2026 and the crew of Balfour Downs are split. At one end of the room are a bunch of stone-faced Queenslanders. At the other end New South Welshmen and Victorians are animated, crowing with the ever-widening scoreline in favour of the Blues. A couple of nonbelievers from other states have already called it a night.

It’s an Origin-worthy team here on the last station in WA’s Pilbara region before the desert takes over. The entire crew has just returned from a mid-season, week-long break and are keen to get back into station life. Manager Andrew Alexander, although a Queenslander, is happy.  “We have such a good crew at the moment,” Andrew says. “A real purple patch of staff.”

The 6,300sq km Balfour Downs, 170km north-east of Newman, was acquired by the Harvest Road group in February 2022 as a breeding block for its paddock-to-plate operation. “It was attractive to us for several reasons,” Ben Dwyer, Harvest Road’s chief operating officer, says. “It is only partially developed, giving us opportunities to sustainably use and rest pastures, it is well watered by the Davis and Oakover rivers and their tributaries, it is of a scale hard to find in WA, it receives rain from the tail end of cyclones that hit the west Pilbara and geographically it is a straight transport leg south to our properties near New Norcia.”

When it came to finding someone to manage the challenges of Balfour, Ben turned to a trusted friend in Andrew. The two met 37 years ago when both were ringers in the NT. “It can be tough to get good talent to run underdeveloped properties, but Andrew was up for the challenge,” Ben says. “He has a great skillset and because he and [his wife] Karla have run their own businesses, they understand finances and how to manage people.”