But the payments pale against the multimillion-dollar salaries earned by current and former heads of AWB's Geneva commodities trading business.

Thierry Dubois, who ran AWB Geneva until leaving on January 26 last year, was paid $6.5 million in retirement benefits, for a total of $6.75 million in 2008.

He collected a total of $6.57 million the previous year, including a $5.86 million bonus, which a spokesman for AWB said related to Geneva's $70 million profit that year.

Mr Dubois' successor, Piero Ravano, who was promoted from head of the chartering operations, received $2.2 million for 2008, including a $1.76 million bonus.

The packages of both men exceeded the earnings rate of the man who runs all of AWB, managing director Gordon Davis.

AWB, which abandoned a $2.5 billion merger scheme with fellow grains group ABB at year's end, revealed the executive payments in its 2008 annual report.

The former Australian Wheat Board, which has endured several years of negative publicity for its involvement in the Iraqi oil-for-food scandal, said the retention payments scheme stemmed from the "unprecedented challenges" faced by AWB.

"These included the loss of the single desk (where AWB controlled exports of Australian wheat production), the opening up of bulk wheat exports to other companies, uncertainty regarding whether the company would be able to reform its dual-share structure, and the continued threat from several class actions," AWB said in the report.

Seven key AWB executives have been named as potential beneficiaries of the retention payments if they are still with the company at the end of this year and in 2010.

For Mr Davis, that means the possibility of another $356,250 this year, and the same in 2010, on top of his existing income — which hit $2.3 million in the latest year, a rise of 35 per cent on 2007.

Mr Davis' salary increase included a near $100,000 rise in his base salary to $858,717, and a gain of almost $200,000 in bonus payments to $902,500.

While his superannuation payments fell to $90,000, his accumulated share-based payments went from $122,500 to $443,000.

Other retention payments to AWB executives if they stay with AWB include $200,000 a year for the head of its Landmark business, Graeme Jacobs, and $150,000 each for chief financial officer Philip Gentry, financial services general manager Colin Taylor and strategy manager John Russell.

AWB's former chairman, Brendan Stewart, received only $225,000 in 2008, compared with $302,899 the previous year.