January 6, 2014

January 6, 2014


Hello again from all of us down south. It was another warm one today but we are beginning to be acclimated to this summer weather. I thought it would be a lot more difficult to bear the heat after being used to the midwest winter, but in all reality it has been quite painless (minus the people who have gotten sunburnt).

Today we visited a university research farm where we toured their cow calf operation. The department that hosted us was the agronomy department where they were focusing on beef cattle production. The part of the country we are currently visiting is in a drought. They ended up the year of 2013, 150 mm short of the average rainfall which converts to nearly six inches short.

In order to visit this operation we had to travel down a loooong rough dirt road. This cow calf operation operates on 2000 hectares, or roughly 5000 acres. The government will not recognize cow calf operations under 1500 hectares or 1750 acres. One of the primary research areas of this farm is the control of an evasive tree. This is a  very slow growing, one cm per year, legume that only grows here in Argentina. The seeds of this tree are located within the fruit of the tree, which the cattle eat, thus spreading the seeds to other areas of the rangeland. The effects of this tree on rangeland appears to be very similar to cedar tree overgrowth that pastures in America can experience.

The only legal approved method of removing these trees is by removing each tree by hand. This method becomes very costly in a fast hurry. The other method currently under research, is not legal. This method involves heavy machinery. The implement used appears to be a large, beefed up version of a stalk roller commonly found back in the States. This is then rolled around the pasture breaking up the trees in its path, thus killing them. This method can only be used on small to moderately small trees. The cost of this current illegal treatment runs around $80 per hectare.

In addition to this tree, their rangeland has a grass that is also an issue to pasture quality. This grass has very low grazing qualities and can continue to overcome rangeland. If this grass becomes too thick, the pasture can become next to worthless. The removal of this grass is expensive to the extent that it is no where near feasible. The average cost of pasture in this area of Argentina is around $500 per hectare. Keep in mind that one hectare is approximately 2.5 acres. The cost of eradication of this grass is roughly $2000 per hectare.

After inspecting their rangeland research we went on to look at their cattle, which is located even further down this rough road. When we arrived, we found what appeared to be the workers weaning the calves off the cow. I was quite surprised by the size of the calves being weaned. The calves were roughly only two months old. These calves will be moved to a feedlot where they will receive special feed due to the lack of presence of rumen in its system. The cows will then be re-bred within the next month. Due to this practice, the nutrition of the cows, and their condition, pregnancy rates run in the range of 60% with a high rate of 85%. These rates really do not seem that terrible when compared to artificial insemination programs, but all of these cows are naturally bred with bulls.
The stocking rate of the cattle on these pastures is one cow, without calf, on 7 hectares in the tree infested pastures, while only 4 hectares are required for one cow on clear rangeland.

At the end of our visit, we inspected their working and load out facility. This being a university establishment, they naturally will have nice equipment. We were told that this working equipment is nicer than 90% of all cattle producers in the country.

As you can see by the pictures, this is not the most impressive facility, and by most standards in the United States are quite rudimentary and even by some crude. The reason for this lack of quality equipment throughout this country makes complete sense when explained.

This country strongly regards a system that resembles the class system of old Europe. There are the elite that own the land and equipment, and then those that do the work. Those that own the equipment and make the monetary decisions do not actually do much of the physical work. Because of this system, the workers are forced to use the equipment at hand and make due with what they have. The next question you may have is why do the workers agree to work under these conditions? The unemployment rate here is quite high, and if the workers complain, they are easily replaced by another person happy to do the job.
Another characteristic of this country that makes this class system so much stronger is the fact that financing is nearly nonexistent. Any purchases made must be done with cash money in savings. This makes it nearly impossible for lower class citizens to escape their economic position. They cannot get a loan to purchase cattle or land to build up their own farm.

After the little that I have experienced here in Argentina, I have really grown to appreciate the structure and system that we have in America. We may have many issues, but overall we truly are blessed to live the life we are able to.

From the south,
Travis Poppe