Observations from Doug Winter, Mill Shoals, Ill.
Today we spent the last full day of the mission traveling to Cascavel to attend the COOPAVEL Rural Show, which is modeled after the Farm Progress Show in the U.S. In fact, the show organizers visited Farm Progress Show to gain inspiration for their show. The event included technical presentations and practical demonstrations for farmers, covering a wide gamut of products and services. Thousands of visitors attend the annual event.
I noticed that their technology is gaining on ours. They really have some advanced equipment coming up, especially with GPS equipment. They are quickly gaining on their acceptance of GPS applications. Some of their other equipment is a few years behind us, such as their wagons, but the harvest equipment is pretty comparable to ours.
Compared to Farm Progress Show, this one does not have field trial demonstrations except for a few small sprayer trials. I think this one is a more compact show. The number of exhibitors is about the same, but they don’t have the expansive displays. We saw several familiar companies such as Case IH, John Deere, Massey Ferguson, most of the major chemical companies such as BASF and DuPont. The seed companies such as Syngenta, DeKalb and Pioneer also were here. We saw a lot of similarities from home.
It’s been an excellent trip and one of the most worthwhile things that we do as far as orienting the board about global competiveness. Brazil is our largest competitor in terms of soybean production. I think the Brazilians are envious of our transportation system but they are growing by leaps and bounds. Technology-wise they are going at it faster than we are.
It’s just a great opportunity to make relationships with farmers that are down here and to meet a lot of different people, both business relationships and friendships.
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