History

In its nearly 24-year history, Pars Ram Brothers has grown from an Export Merchant to a Global Commodity Traders & Millers.

14th May, 1976 - Pars Ram Brothers (Aust.) Pty Ltd was established. Representing the established Singapore commodities firm of Pars Ram Brothers (PRB) Punj came to Australia as a young man to promote the sale of oriental spices. After working closely with the CSIRO station at Warwick to select a suitable strain of chickpea, Punj began the quest to convince local farmers to change over to the new crop. Such was his belief in the viability of the industry that he guaranteed the purchase of the crop from every farmer willing to grow it.

1984: When the first commercial crop was harvested in Queensland, the cultivation of chick peas has spread to NSW, Victoria and South Australia. Wheat farmers now prefer chick peas as a rotation crop because the nodules in their root systems store nitrogen, which is returned to the soil. More farmers are joining the rank of chick pea growers every year, since they can earn as much as $300 a tonne for chick peas compared with about $200 a tonne for wheat. At their automated $2.5 million Brisbane plant, PRB has developed a splitting or de-hulling process. De-hulled chickpeas represent 80 percent of PRB's export sales with a value added of 40 percent over the unsplit variety.

1987: The success of the industry was such that it prompted then prime minister, Bob Hawke, to invite Founder of the Company, Mr Punj to Canberra where he was presented to visiting Indian Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, as an Australian of Indian descent who had helped introduce a new export industry.

1988: In a successful effort at diversification, PRB established a travel agency, Ingwest, offering tours to India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal. Ingwest contributes $5 million annually to the group's annual earnings.

1990:The spectacular growth of the industry in the past decade has seen the establishment of two de-hulling factories in Victoria and three in Queensland. Pars Ram's Brisbane premises are a "quarantined bonded cargo area" containing 24 silos with a storage capacity of 3,000 tonnes.
Recent developments by the group include the export of ferrous and non-ferrous metals to India and Indonesia.

1991: In recognition of Company contribution, PRB received the CSIRO Award for Industry.

1996: Earlier PRB has established the Ingwest Educational Promotion Center with the primary intent of promoting Australian Universities in India.

2000: To provide more efficient service to customers and suppliers PRB management readily embraces new millennium technology. In 2000 the company invested near half a million dollars to upgrade computer systems and install state of art communication network.