Day 3 – Agricultural and Animal Production

          Today we got the opportunity to learn about three main categories of common Argentine agricultural practices: crop production, animal production, and the use of silo bags.  We explored a relatively large farming operation, known as El Volcan, right outside of Balcarce and a more common farm of approximately 3,500 hectares that was approximately 30 km away.

El Volcan

             When considering the animal production aspect, El Volcan maintains a herd of 1,500 head of cattle.  However, at this location, the cattle are utilized mainly for breeding purposes instead of human consumption.  We discovered that their breeding system is fairly similar to that in the United States.  Over the past 20 years, El Volcan has imported a vast amount of cow embryos from the United States, but they cannot import actual cattle because of the risk of spreading disease.  Overall, the farm has a sufficient paddock system of approximately 500 hectares (1250 acres) designated for cattle use. 

Bailey and Celeste ~ Todays Writers!

                On the other hand, it was very fascinating to learn about their crop production system down here.  There are some similarities to back home, but there are numerous differences as well.  First of all, as compared to most Argentine farmers who rent land on a one-year lease basis, this farm is managed by a family corporation who actually own all of their 10,000 hectares.  The 34 employees perform 92% of the total work throughout the year, and the remaining 8% (mainly harvest operations) is on contract.  Also, it was interesting to explore the large amount of diversity they have in the crops they produce.  Not only do they grow corn and soybeans, but they also produce wheat, barely, sunflowers, and some potatoes.  In a given year, they receive an average corn yield of 150 bushels/acre and soybean yield of 45-55 bushels/acre.  It was also surprising to see this farm use some forms of precision ag since only about 5% of the nation utilize this technology.

Taking CO2 samples.

            The last part of the day was spent exploring how Argentines utilize silo bags.  Silo bags have been shown to be an efficient and cost-effective alternative to grain bins.  They cost approximately $420 and tend to be 9 meters in diameter and 60 meters in length.  However, they can be slightly customized from those dimensions to fit the farmer’s needs.  The most interesting fact about the silo bags was that they account for almost 45 million metric tons of grain storage in Argentina which equals roughly 2 billion bushels. When looking at permanent storage fixtures in the United States, grain can be monitored by looking at temperature and carbon dioxide levels. The silo bags, however, use just one of these indicators. Temperature is not a great method of measuring the grain conditions as the heat will transfer automatically to the ground and air. The temperatures of the grain stored in these bags will just follow the average temperatures throughout the year. Carbon dioxide is a better indicator though. Since the grain is in a tight, confined space, it is very easy to detect the CO₂ levels using technology created through the INTA program. These levels have certain standards that should be met, and a farmer can easily figure out if there is a problem with the grain being stored, however, one may not know how big the problem is.                              

Silo bags filled with sunflower seeds.

            Tonight dinner is on our own. Empanadas here we come!!!