Hola!

After traveling many hours we were excited to start learning about agriculture in Argentina. INTA, comparable to the USDA in the United States, provided great insight. Having 54 research stations throughout the country and employing 7,000 people, they had lots to share. With all of the students on this trip coming from family farms, we were intrigued by their ability to have two growing seasons. We questioned the impact that it had on the nutrient level within the soil. To limit the damage, 90% of the country practices no-till.


Many of the students asked questions to see the differences between their production practices and ours. They apply chemicals to their crops, and apply fertilizers. The research acknowledge that they should probably apply more fertilizers, but cost is a limiting factor. How they fatten their cattle is in transition from a traditional pasture to the feedlots we would be used to. Another difference is that farmers own little to no machinery.


Transportation and storage are major concerns for growers. Transportation is inefficient, and very expensive. It is primarily done by trucks as they lack they lack the railroads and barge systems that we have. As their production continues to grow, the challenges that they face with storage is grow as well. One of the solutions that they have found are silo bags, similar to the silage bags we would see in the United States. Even with the many differences, we face similar challenges as well. One of them being consumers demanding more transparency. In Argentina, similar to the United States, they are trying to find ways to trace the origin of where food comes from.


In afternoon, we had the opportunity to go see a potato farmer in action along with Ricardo and Juancito. Juancito worked in potato research at the INTA Station and then in England for a little over two years. The farmer farms only potatoes since the inputs are so high. It costs between  $8000-$10000 to grow an  acre of potatoes! Each hectare of potatoes produces 50 metric tons of potatoes! And each hectare takes about an hour to harvest. The field is 200 hectares.....(that's 200 hours of harvesting for those of you not blessed mathematically.) They also rotate the fields every 8 years. This is to help cut down on diseases and viruses that can play havoc with the yields and viability of the crop. There is a lot of specialized machinery involved in their production, as well as manpower. The harvester runs the potatoes on a series of conveyors and belts to clean dirt off the potatoes as well as discard any plant residue that is left. On the final conveyor, an operator stands and picks out any dirt clods that have snuck through by hand. The main thing about harvesting potatoes is that you have to be gentle with them. A drop of 3 yards is enough to bruise one significantly. So a lot of the design of the harvester is with gentleness in mind. We all got a chance to ride on the harvester and help with the sorting of the potatoes.

Potato Harvester (with Rebekah manning the sorting table)

          Tonight is dinner on our own, a late one since most Argentinians don't eat dinner til at least 9 pm! Until then we have some free time, and after that it'll probably be off to bed for most of us.

Trace and Rebekah (yes we really are both that short, short arms are bad for potato sorting btw)

Trace and Rebekah