Harvard PhD Ray Goldberg – speech at IFAMA

By dana.bucur Comment Closed
Dr. Ray Goldberg, Harvard father of IFAMA  (Food and Agribusiness Management Asociation)received prize at Boston IFAMA meeting with food firms. He also received the Doctor Honoris Causa from the Universidad de Buenos Aires. Here a brief of his speech “We don’t have to tell this generation that food and health and hunger, etc., are high priority—they know it—as evidenced by “Food, Inc.” being nominated for an Academy Award. “Some 16 years ago at Harvard, I tried to put together a group of consumer activists, private sector, public sector and agriculture to look at the industry. At first they called each other names. Over time, they realized they share a common ground—all trying to improve the global food system for society’s needs. I have gained a sense of optimism for the next 20 years—there are more saints than villains. “The farmer has finally become global—and farmers elsewhere are no longer competitors but partners in the production of food for the global population. We are all...
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Silos and transport ‘offer good scope for profits’

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Companies have a "good opportunity to make money" building the infrastructure needed to feed a world population growing by some 100m people a year, a top executive at oilseeds giant Bunge has said. While the need to raise crop production by 1.7bn tonnes in the first half of the century to feed the growing population had been appreciated, the problems of transporting and storing the extra had been largely ignored, Carl Hausmann said. "The infrastructure needs of the world have been underinvested in over the last several year," said Mr Hausmann, the former chief executive of Bunge in Europe and North America, now head of the agribusiness giant's corporate affairs. "But if farmers do not get more facilities to store, deliver crops, they cannot increase their production. Infrastructure is a linchpin of the entire agricultural system." Public vs private sectors Developing the transport facilities and silos needed to meet this demand looked likely to come down to private companies, given the squeezes on public sector...
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Why farmers need a pay rise

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By Lucy Knight FARMERS are in need of a pay rise if they're to be expected to keep producing food for the world, a parliamentary hearing in Canberra was told last week. Science writer and former head of CSIRO media, Professor Julian Cribb, told a Senate Inquiry on food production last week that major investments in farmers were needed to make it worth their while getting out of bed each day. What's happening instead, he said, is increasing competition for cheap food supplies by major supermarket chains the world "closing down" or "destroying" local industries and driving more and more people out of agriculture. Professor Cribb has recently launched a new book, The Coming Famine, where he speaks of the global food challenge and what efforts are needed to avoid it, including an entire chapter on securing a 'fair deal for farmers'. He told the hearing the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation...
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40 Investing Quotes To Lead You Through Any Market

By dana.bucur Comment Closed
Via: www.investinganswers.com 1. Those with the enterprise lack the money and those with the money lack the enterprise to buy stocks when they are cheap.   -Benjamin Graham 2. A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business.   -Henry Ford 3. Experience taught me a few things. One is to listen to your gut, no matter how good something sounds on paper. The second is that you're generally better off sticking with what you know. And the third is that sometimes your best investments are the ones you don't make.   -Donald Trump 4. After all, the chief business of the American people is business. They are profoundly concerned with producing, buying, selling, investing and prospering in the world.   -Calvin Coolidge 5. "Investing should be more like watching paint dry or watching grass grow. If you want excitement, take $800 and go to Las Vegas.   -Paul Samuelson 6. If investing is entertaining, if ...
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Romania – The European Commission approved aid scheme for diesel used in agriculture

By dana.bucur Comment Closed
Date: May 29th 2010 European Commission announced the Romanian Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development the decision on state aid for applying a rate of excise duty of eur 21 per 1000 litres for diesel used in agriculture. After analyzing GD no. 408/2010 approving State aid granted for diesel used in agriculture, the Commission made no objection and decided that an agreed scheme is compatible with the internal market. However, in its assessment, the Commission found that the legislative act complies with "Community guidelines on state aid in the agriculture and forestry 2007-2013’ and that reducing the duty established by legislative act is intended to help facilitate the development of certain activities or regions economic, without trading conditions to an extent contrary to the common interest. Following the opinion, GD no 408/2010 shall enter into force from Thursday, May 27th 2010. Agricultural diesel users, potential beneficiaries of the scheme should apply, at each supply with diesel sales tax documents (invoices) issued by providers...
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Land may become top asset class – beating shares

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LAND may become the world's biggest asset class, and listed farm operators win an upward rerating, Hardman & Co has said in a report identifying agriculture services groups as the next focus of sector investment. Farmland prices have, in doubling in the UK and US over the last decade, made shares look "an embarrassingly inept bet", the London broker said. Stocks have fallen by 10-20% during the same period. And the outperformance looks set to continue, driven by rising food prices and demand from investment funds. Population pressure Farmland, whose $5,000bn value equates to about 7-10% of the value of world equity markets, could be worth 15-25% of share values by 2020. "By 2050, it is possible to argue that food producing land might have a superior value to all other asset classes," Hardman analyst Doug Hawkins said, noting forecasts of rising global populations. "This land is feeding over 6bn people and is being pressed into feed a further 3bn by 2050." The broker noted the...
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Ukraine’s agriculture companies – golden eggs or rotten potatoes?

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May 14, 2010 By Roman Olearchyk Via: www.ft.com Even in Europe’s most depressed large economy, there are a few shafts of commercial light. Ukraine, where gross domestic product fell last year by a whopping 15 per cent, is witnessing a flurry of investment into its promising agricultural sector. Businessman Oleg Bakhmatyuk is mulling whether to take his farming company - Ukrlandfarming - public after this month sealing a $1bn valuation for Avangardco Investments. Egg producer Avangardco - which Bakhmatyuk owns - listed a 22 per cent stake on the London Stock Exchange. Now investment bankers in Kiev said Cyprus-registered Ukrlandfarming could raise $50-80mn via an IPO on London’s AIM this year. A handful of Ukrainian agribusiness companies have gone public on European exchanges in recent years, including sunflower oil producer Kernel, as well as farming companies Landkom and Mriya Agro. But apart from large-scale investments brought in by multinational agribusiness giants, including Cargill and ADM, the inflow of investment into promising domestically-owned companies is only starting...
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Hot 100: Britain’s mega-growth companies

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Via: http://realbusiness.co.uk/hot_100_2010/the_hot_100_2010_rankings_list Real Business ranking of this year's fastest growing private companies. Size does matter here. From bomb-disposal firms and online retailers to fresh-fish suppliers and recruitment companies, here is the 2010 list of mega-growth businesses: http://media.caspianpublishing.co.uk/document/bf20291c62ab28769a8da9767f146afc.pdf In the top 20, on 13 there is an agricultural UK company: Dunns (Long Sutton) -Dunns is a privately owned major independant UK Seed  company which also specializes in premium quality edible Peas and Beans. ...
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Information the key to grains success in 2010

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Author: Gregor Heard Source: http://fw.farmonline.com.au WITH a deregulated grains market, farmers are increasingly realising the vital importance of sound market intelligence when making marketing decisions. If the first year of deregulation was the year of on-farm storage, the 2009 season saw a huge increase in the number of brokers and analysts providing that crucial information to growers. The trend is only likely to increase, as farmers seek to find a marketing edge by assessing the micro and macro trends emerging within the market. From supply and demand balance sheets within key domestic use regions of Australia, to a snapshot of the international situation, many farmers have decided it is worth the price of hiring an expert in these areas. Contacts are also crucial, and middlemen, linking up producers with reliable domestic end-use customers, are also regarded as being worth their cut. The other major growth area in 2009 was specialised marketing products, from Elders Toepfer’s on-farm storage accreditation program, to GrainCorp’s initiative to link warehoused grain with...
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Flax and industrial hemp for fibre

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How many of us have the courage to plant new crops? To place together people, financial resources, perseverance and total dedication is not handy to anybody. Plus that it is needed a business-driven man to catalyze permanently in a constructive way the new initiative. What are you going to do when there is not a critical mass of market players, culture (information, disponibility), know-how, real agricultural machines, people/a current to support it. I would like to invite you to get familiar with two new crops: flax and industrial hemp for fibre. Too few people really know about it (hemp being a traditional crops in the early age of Romania). I have been involved in such a project i.e. industrial hemp for fibre (from prospecting markets to cropping and harvesting fibre and seed). The information is availbale through website by courtesy of Romanian Ministry of Agriculture, Forests and Rural Development: http://www.madr.ro/pages/page.php?self=01&sub=0104&var=010402&art=0408 This information is in Romanian, if you are interested please let me know and I will be...
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