Archive for the ‘Agricultural Marketing’ Category

Article by Dario Terry

When it comes to selecting fresh produce, it’s all too easy to get into a rut. With the globalization of agriculture, seasonal fruit and vegetables are a thing of the past. Fresh produce can be flown into our local supermarkets from around the world, and we are no longer exposed to the seasonal limitations imposed by Mother Nature. Strawberries in January? No problem! Oranges in July? Ditto!

Those who advocate buying and eating only locally grown fresh fruit and vegetables often speak from a position of reducing carbon emissions from planes, trains, and trucks used to transport produce around the world. Others buy locally because they want to reduce our dependence on big agribusiness and instead support small farms near where they live. While both viewpoints are valid, there are four other great arguments for buying and cooking vegetables and fruits that are grown locally: diversity, flavor, price, and nutrition. Read the rest of this entry »

Article by Erik

When considering jobs in agriculture, you must think both large and small. Large is agribusiness, big corporations developing new crops, fertilizers, pesticides and other products to produce high yield crops. Small, on the other hand, is the move toward local, organic foods, and small farms with hand raised crops and animals.

Agribusiness and large scale farming continues to be the primary source of food in the United States and many other nations. While traditional agricultural jobs of raising crops and animals remain important, agribusiness also encompasses numerous career paths in research and development as well as sales, marketing, and education. Jobs in agriculture are not the first thing one thinks of when studying biochemistry, engineering, biotechnology, or even computer sciences, but any of those degrees can open a path to lucrative employment in the agribusiness sector. As more and more functions become computerized, and as demand for food rises with population growth worldwide, high tech jobs in agriculture will continue to expand. Workers with both high tech and agricultural knowledge will be in demand. Read the rest of this entry »

It is usually assumed that “big is best” because of the financial savings that can be made from economies of scale, and this has been one of the drivers of the trend to large-scale farming.

There is, however, a growing body of opinion that the reverse is true and that food security, diversity and sustainable agriculture may be better achieved by supporting the world’s small and family farmers.

According to the US campaigning organisation foodfirst.org industrial-scale agriculture tends to focus on monocultures because they are the simplest to manage with heavy machinery.

The UK’s Foresight Project and foodfirst.org both argue that small-scale farming is likely to be more diverse, more flexible and more environmentally friendly.

However, it is perhaps no coincidence that large-scale operations are referred to as agribusiness, with all this implies about the importance about making a profit for shareholders and also growing what is likely to produce the highest returns, such as the current shift in agriculture to producing biofuels.

The UK farming periodical Farmers Weekly recently published an article arguing that large-scale agriculture represented a threat to small farmers who are already struggling to make a living. The dominant form of food production throughout the major developing regions of the world, particularly in Africa and Asia, is smallholder and family farming. It is also widespread throughout the developed world.

The most recent World Bank Report says that more and more people are being pushed into extreme poverty by rising food prices. It said that food prices had risen by 36% since April 2010 and predicted that up to ten million more people could fall below the extreme poverty threshold of less than 76p per day in the next few months. This is on top of the extra 44 million people who have been pushed into food poverty during the last year.

The pressure on farmers to produce more to meet the needs of a growing global population is therefore intensifying and it makes sense to make the best use of all the sources of food production on the planet, large and small.

Although small farms are likely to plant mixtures of crops, to use techniques like intercropping and to rotate crops and livestock, with manure serving to replenish soil fertility, they will nevertheless need some support if they are to increase their production.

It is in the areas of access to new agricultural technology, such as low-chem biopesticides, biofungicides and yield enhancers, and to training in their use, where small farmers could most benefit.

Such products are derived largely from naturally occurring sources and would fit well into the mix of existing sustainable small farming methods and techniques to enhance yield and reduce crop loss from disease and damage.

They are expensive to research, trial and license, however, and therefore need strong support from governments, including perhaps financial subsidies, if they are to be affordable for the smaller producers.

Every little increase in production can only help towards ensuring that there are adequate food supplies for the future, but also there is evidence that small farms producing for local markets increase local prosperity, food security and promote better social cohesion.

The U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Agriculture’s hearings on competition are likely going to recognize that the increased demand for these types of plant products is going to require closer vertical coordination between plant producers and those handling and processing these plants into food products. Such coordination requires more information about the plants being produced and sold to handlers and processors. If market power exists, it is likely going to be in retail supermarkets and food service where the demand for such products is known and can be communicated by price to processors and handlers, and ultimately to producers.

The mere prospect of studying a management course is quite exciting. Students, irrespective of their region, wish that they could study MBA or other management courses to add to their repertoire of qualifications. The craze for management courses seems to be a global phenomenon, nowadays.

To provide the students an opportunity to study management, a number of management colleges have come up in recent years in various parts of the country. They are offering various courses like post graduate diploma, master’s degree, executive programs, and part time MBA degrees to the interested students who choose according to their feasibility and requirements.

Of the various options in the country, students are warming up to the idea of studying in the symbiosis institutes in different cities, spearheaded by the Symbiosis Institute of Business Management. There are about 8 different colleges under the Symbiosis group of institutions which can be taken admissions into through the common eligibility test of Symbiosis National Aptitude Test that is usually conducted in the month of December.

By the time the results are out in the month of January, students are ready with their application forms to apply in the institutes that they wish to study in. Even they can choose the subjects in which they wish to pursue their management degrees. But each college and course has to be separately applied for, by requisitioning application forms by paying the application fees separately.

Securing a rank in the SNAP test doesn’t ensure the students an admission in any college of their choice. Only after applying in a college of their choice, they would be selected on the basis of their marks in the exam and then only the process of admission is completed. And by the month of May – June, the courses are good to go.

The test has been designed to test the aptitude of the students in making quick decisions by solving stiff questions in a duration of 2 hours. Students are required to solve questions related to verbal reasoning, quantitative aptitude, general awareness and analytical and logical reasoning. These questions are of the objective type and for the well prepared are quite easy to solve, although solving them in a limited time is what gives the credit in form of a rank.

It has been long now that the Symbiosis Institutes have been established and have been providing quality management education in various streams such as dual specializations in systems or marketing and finance, HR, Hospital and health care, information and communication technology, international business, agribusiness, computer applications, geoinformatics, operations management, communication management, marketing communications, etc.

These are subjects, which are very relevant to the current market trends and suitable for the present market economy. The test of SNAP has been quite a benefit for the students who wish to pursue their education of management courses from a good management school. Satisfying so many wishes of students from all over the country as well as from foreign countries, the Symbiosis institutes have been striving for the success of management studies in India.

Mixed Signals For Fertilizer Companies

Article by Charles Rotblut

Key Points:

* Urea prices fell by more than in late September * A strike is helping to support potash prices * Some analysts are raising 2009 earnings forecasts * Highlighted stocks include AGU, CF, MOS, POT and TRA

Fears that fertilizer companies could be losing pricing power sent their shares tumbling late last week.

The primary cause was a sharp drop in urea prices. A report published last Thursday on Farm Futures revealed a decline in Black Sea prices over the previous 2 weeks. (Ammonia prices were weaker as well.) Read the rest of this entry »

Aon Corp the insurance broker

Article by Andrew Andreeff

Whether are you the skilled professional or only realisation of your career, at Aon there is a possibility for you. As the leader broker and a consulting firm in the field of insurance services in the world, with offices in more than 120 countries, Aon Corp offers a huge variety of ways of insurance.

Aon one of the world’s largest insurance brokers.

Aon (the head office of the company is located in Chicago (the USA)) is one of the largest international service providers in areaManagements of risks, broker support in sphere of insurance and reinsurance, consultation concerning system of motivation and privileges for the personnel. Read the rest of this entry »

Will agriculture be the new “hot investment”? Writing in the Wall Street Journal’s Heard on the Street, Richard Barley says with an estimated 9.2 billion mouths to feed in the world by 2050 and wealthier emerging markets demanding higher protein diets…this might be a good time to invest in agribusiness stocks. He cites the manager of a new agriculture fund for BlackRock who notes that “once such shifts in diet start, they prove irreversible, implying greater grain production to feed livestock, and greater use of technology to boost crop yields. At the same time, planned increases in biofuel production will reduce the amount of land available for food.”

Barley says the demand will require investment to increase crop yields, “That should favor companies that supply agricultural equipment and inputs such as fertilizer as well as farming businesses themselves.” He points to Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan which controls 20 percent of the world’s potash supply and is trading at 18.5 times its projected 2010 earnings.

But, there is risk involved as the markets are cyclical and can be quite volatile.