|
 Special - july/aug 2003
Production Management of Soybean Seed
Elton Hamer
elton@vsp.com.br
Eleri Hamer
eleri@terra.com.br
It can be said that the production management of soybean seeds with quality and profitability, suitable to the effectuated investments, presents two great challenges:
1. Foreseeing at harvesting, the final quality of the seeds in the sowing period.
2. Forming price for the long-term commercialization.
In order to obtain success in seeds production, several factors are necessary, among them; one stands out, in first place, a good planning, which is mainly linked to the cultivar portfolio in which the market target is the producer. (Ex. areas with nematodes are catchers of resistant or tolerant materials to these diseases and there are variations of yield and cultivar adaptations to different regions, such as latitude, altitude among other aspects.); and in second place, obtaining customer's fidelity, so that this planning can be closer as possible to demand.
The climatic conditions are responsible for many losses of seed fields and for that reason sowing stagger becomes necessary, in other words, sowing out of the recommended time, is a task for trying to avoid the simultaneous maturation in the field of a same cultivar. This stagger can represent the reduction of the cultivars productivity, mainly those of medium and precocious cycle, which results in a significant increase of production costs.
In the State of Mato Grosso-Brazil, since the last three years, about 80% of the soybean seeds commercialization occurs from January to June, beginning even before the harvesting period. Remaining absent of the market, today very competitive, can affect business. Those sales anticipation, however, forces the companies to establish quality monitoring programs to foresee performance potential of the seeds at sowing.
Among the main relevant damages that affect quality of the soybean seed, there are mechanical and insect damages, and damages caused by moisture. We should consider that the mechanical damage occurs mainly during the harvesting process and inadequate regulation of harvesting machines. In an experiment performed at Arco-Iris Seeds Company, it was observed through the tetrazolium test in seeds with an average moisture content of 13%, that when those seeds passed 20 times through a centrifugal discharge elevator, in an speed of 1,5m/s, it caused a damage 50% inferior to the one caused by the increase of 100rpm in the cylinder rotation of the harvesting machine. Therefore, mechanical damage is perfectly controllable and it is inadmissible that well structured seed companies loose their production fields due to seeds mechanical damage.
The damage caused by insects (thumbtack) requires a lot of attention due to the toxins that they can introduce in the seeds.
The damage level caused by those insects are related to the number of insects for square meter per checking to the time in exposition, to the ninfal or adult phase, and to the crop stage. Greater the amount of seeds' dry matter, bigger is the damage extension, since that seeds with more dry matter tend to deform less with the insect bite and hardly ever they will be separated during processing. Let's not forget that the adult insects migration from neighboring farming with more precocious maturation, tends to cause damages faster.
The experience of 14 years working in the production system at Arco-Iris Seeds Company, indicates the need to check every four days the fields destined to seeds production, and the control level should be on average of 0,5 insects (thumbtacks) for each checking, considering nymphs and adults. In the evaluation, it's recommended a minimum of 40 checkings for each field of 200 hectares. With this control, damages below 7% are obtained in the tetrazolium test, in the class 1-8 (total damages); 4%, in the class 4-5 (vigor loss); and 2%, in the class 6-8 (dead seeds).
The insects (thumbtacks) control has been demanding an average of three to four applications of insecticides per field, using the traditionally recommended insecticides. Larger dosages than the recommended by the manufacturer, are also necessary. The control is necessary up to 6-8 days before harvesting.
On the other hand, the great villain of the seed production is the deterioration caused by moisture, evolutionary damage and the most accentuated one among others physiologic damages, being able to be controlled, only, by harvesting anticipation.
The anticipation is possible with desiccation, which necessarily does not implicate in making good use of the field, which may be harmed by climatic conditions after desiccation. This technique may be done between the reproductive phases R7.2 and R7.5, because the plants with legumes from green seeds still did not reach the maturation point, i.e. they still did not change from the program "development" to "germination". The desiccation, in this phase, provides an harvesting anticipation of 2 or 3 days.
The main origins of the moisture damages are the lack of maturation uniformity, which occurs in a plant population of a same cultivar and in the lack of maturation synchronism of the legumes, inside the same plant.
In a trial carried out during three crop years, it was observed that the period that elapses between the maturation of the first plants in relation to most of the population maturation, that allows mechanical harvesting, could reach 15 days. It was also observed that almost half of the plants with more precocious maturation could suffer a harvesting delay of one week. Those plants are usually submitted to high moisture variation, due to rainfall occurrence in the period of relative humidity variation, forming dew.
Not only rainfall excess, during the period of maturation, causes moisture damages to the seeds. Very dry periods, with less or no rainfall, also causes damages, due to the rapid contraction of the forehead (tegument), causing small ruptures in the dorsal region of the seeds. These damages that occur in the dorsal region of the seeds (also denominated as grooves), usually can be observed by naked eye or with magnifying glasses of 20 increases, in the field level.
Another factor that increases moisture deterioration, depending on the environmental conditions in the production site, is the rupture of the tegument, that happens because of the exaggerating tissues expansion in the first 10 days of seed filling, due to high temperature and humidity. This exaggerating expansion may also be related to field yield, considering that greater the productivity, the bigger the size of the seeds, inside of the same cultivar and, probably, superior to the genetic information for the tegument expansion.
Therefore, seeds with ruptures are more susceptible to moisture variations at harvesting period. Their cicatrix is not perfect and this susceptibility is proportional to the proximity of the rupture hypocotyl - radicle axis.
Deterioration caused by moisture can also increase mechanical damages, due to the fragility of the tegument during mechanical harvesting. It means that moisture deterioration can, erroneously, be identified as a mechanical damage on the tetrazolium test.
In synthesis, the prediction of the seeds future quality (value at sowing) and the consequent utilization or not of the field, requires a series of attentions, emphasizing the following ones:
1. Field emergence;
2. Monitoring rains and temperatures from seed filling;
3. Visual observation of the field uniformity, one day before harvesting;
4. Visual observation of the seeds before and after harvesting.
It is advisable to carry out the tetrazolium test, a quick and highly informative one, at pre- harvesting, after drying, processing, and at the final period of storage, for minimizing field losses.
Soybean seed with moisture injury
Soybean seed coat with injury
Processing, marketing and price formation for long-term commercialization
Undoubtedly, it is no use knowing all the necessary procedures for the production of a good seed, if there is not a proper execution of it. Knowledge is not enough, it is necessary to execute it.
Proper management is directly related to training, satisfaction level, and team spirit of the company's staff.
One of the basic principles of modern management of organizations consists in the participation of profits and results, in other words, productivity gain. In our opinion, in a seed company, all the employees, from the field to the expedition, regardless of function or hierarchical position, should obligatorily receive, besides fixed wages, extras for productivity and mainly, for quality.
Those processes of rewards are known as instrumental controls, which induces the employee or collaborator to behave, as their superior wants.
In its evolution, it is possible to realize the appearance of beliefs and particular values of the group such as, rates of minimum mechanical damages better than the ones established by the company, which is formally known as normative control, and it is assuming an outstanding roll in the production management. So, the sub-groups of productive process assume self-management characteristics, therefore earning credibility, and profit each ones experience, and letting the managers handle the strategic activities.
It is important to remember that this variable wages get in conflict with the management concepts of many companies including the rural ones.
We frequently see rural companies still administrating their productive processes and employees according to the originating precepts of the Industrial Revolution of XVII and XVIII centuries, when the production pressure used to prevail, the economical liberalism and the unbridled search for capital at all costs. At that time, people were seen as replaceable pieces of a machine, and the solutions combined rigid supervision and direct or indirect punishments, putting aside the awards and rewards, that are so important to stimulate the performance and the collaborators' initiative.
Production field with uniform maturation
So, extras for productivity and quality or participation in profits and results, only becomes improvements in the production processes, if performances criteria are pre-defined, known, and discussed by the interested ones.
In certain rural companies the variable portion of salaries are related to the subjective criteria or to the mercy of the owner or administrator's humor, at the end of the growing season. In this way, the employee is stimulated to discredit in the real intention of the award, so the portion becomes a cost for the company, instead of an investment, capable of forming effective team.
Defining proper criteria that will not discourage the employees and neither have an effect on the production costs, requires time and a qualified staff to develop them.
In the relevant aspect of knowing how to execute, there are also clear definitions on how to avoid power conflicts, and the friendly organizational changing that generates continuous learning and it also stimulates the autonomy of the work, in a certain way, their absence is the reason for the accentuated labor rotation in the section.
In synthesis, salary is not everything. But if added to respect, participation and communication, it forms teams capable of generating excellent results, even in extremely hard times.
Another important aspect which concerns seed marketing, although the best one is its quality, is a well planned programs to promote an aggregation of a value to a product, turning it into a high quality product. What does not support any company is quality without marketing or even worse, marketing without quality, having as a consequence not only losses in sales, which is quantifiable, but mainly in the way that customers see the company.
Unlike of what others may think, marketing is not only restricted to distribution, advertising and publicity, it also requires a market study in a wider way, including production process, presentation of the product and formation of competitive prices, attempting to assist the consumers' current and potential needs, in order to obtain profit.
In short, the main function of marketing consists of conducting a corporate strategy in order to accomplish the promises made to the clients by the company.
In the company, there are two aspects that deserve prominence: the first concerns about the sales orientation of the company, that must be directed to short period, the second one concerns about the marketing orientation, that must be directed to long period.
So, in a general way, most of the rural companies, that have a concern in this sense, they end up having an accelerated rhythm in marketing, without the deserved planning, which actually confers an orientation of sales. In this way, the marketing department is able to exist in theory and even have a manager or someone in charge, but it will limit on serving sales, creating support material, promotional events and also analysis after sales results. In other words, instead of impelling, it will be impelled by sales.
It is so true that most of the companies, even the rural ones, the marketers tend to concentrate in sales, putting aside the quality of the market share (market percentage), where they should wonder if the customers that won or lost are the mutant or Jurassic type (they keep changing their supplier or they remain with the same), if they were bought (promotion at any cost) or if they were won and, finally, if the market where they act is contracting or expanding.
On the other hand, everyone in the company needs to sell the products or the services produced by the company. In other words, a culture turned to sales must be developed so that their employees from all sections, can contribute to increase income, which only happens when they know the whole production process and when they realize on how their actions interfere in the quality of the final product, as well as, in their variable portion of remuneration.
That is to say: "marketing must be perfectly aligned with the objectives, strategies and mission of the company". The problem in this sense is that many rural companies do not have clear objectives, or a true north, and when they do, it is not transmitted sharply with explicit directing lines for the attainment of the operations to whom it may concern. These points of view, many times, are transmitted partially or as empty rhetoric, not allowing realistic expectations and contusing plan promotions.
In practice, other great difficulty frequently faced by seed companies is to come up with prices that simultaneously are attractive to the consumers and that are able to make satisfactory margins for the seed company, but with long-term payments for 08/30 or 09/30 of the year in course.
What happens is that the formation of the final cost of the seed reveals to be extremely dependent of its raw material, assuming for itself between 60% to 80% of its cost. Since it is a commodity, it is conditioned to exchange variation and, consequently, to the offer and demand of the soybean grain at national and international level.
Another particularity of seeds commercialization, is related to the fact that every seed producer is also a producer of commercial grains. Therefore, they also participate in this market that has been presenting a significant price increase in the period between harvest seasons. To exemplify, there have already been cases where the long-term seed commercialization generated smaller incomes in the date of the reception than if the same had been commercialized to the smashing industries, even purging the other production costs.
For that reason, soybean seed tends to participate, more and more, in the cash market avoiding the spot market (point to point, which doesn't assure the fidelity of the customer) in order to reduce the uncertainty regarding to the behavior of final price and also of the margins.
|
|
............
|
