RTRS announces new members in 2020
Bakkavor Foods Ltd., Foyle Food Group Ltd., Koppert Biological Systems, KellyDeli, Premier Foods PLC and SOK Corporation Join the Association in Q1
In this 2018/2019 harvest year, the lack of rain, especially in January, affected the development of soybeans in Bahia. During the grain filling phase, the lack of rain had an impact on the size of the grain, which now has a negative impact on the harvest and impacts the productivity of the oilseed.
According to AIBA - Association of Farmers and Irrigators of Bahia, soy is the flagship of agricultural production in Western Bahia, occupying more than 65% of the total area cultivated in the region. Currently, soy from western Bahia corresponds to around 5% of national production and 58% of production in the Northeast. The estimate is that the current harvest will have a loss of 20% compared to the last harvest.
During this Thursday, March 19th, it will rain in all regions of the Northeast and in several areas of Bahia there may be moderate to heavy rain. Autumn begins this Friday, March 20th, at 00:50, Brasília time, and ends on June 20th, at 18:44 pm (Brasília).
Today is Saint Joseph's Day (March 19) and in the belief of northeasterners, if it rains on Saint Joseph's Day, then "winter" (the rainiest period of the year) will have plenty of rain. Autumn is a time of a lot of rain in much of the Northeast.
Minister Tereza Cristina (Agriculture, Livestock and Supply) stated that Brazilian agriculture continues to produce successfully and supply the market. "Brazil is a great breadbasket, a food producer, and we don't need to have any negative expectations that we won't have food for our people," she said, referring to the changes in Brazilians' routines, imposed by the coronavirus pandemic.
The minister highlighted that the population must remain calm regarding the supply of food products at retail and praised rural producers. "They are our heroes, who at this moment are there (in the field) working hard, producing and producing the largest harvest harvested in this country, beating each other's records to feed our population."
The 2020/2021 grain harvest estimate should be 251,9 million tons, 4,1% above the previous harvest, according to a survey released on the 10th by the National Supply Company (Conab), linked to Mapa.
Routine monitoring carried out by the Ministry does not detect any indication of a problem in the supply of food products in the country. In addition to the producer's work in the field, Tereza Cristina said that the positive performance currently recorded by Brazilian agriculture is due to the science and technology developed mainly by the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (Embrapa), linked to Mapa.
An agreement was signed with the Financier of Studies and Research (Finep), an institution linked to MCTIC, an agreement that aims to identify convergences of action between the two parties that encourage the incorporation of innovations developed by Embrapa into company strategy. This action should strengthen Embrapa's private partners with financing from Finep, enabling the expansion of its technologies to the market.
The president of Embrapa, Celso Moretti, highlighted that Brazilian agriculture is "driven by science" and that, in the last almost five decades, Brazil has stopped importing to be one of the largest producers and exporters. "Today we feed seven Brazils and we only had this because the country made the decision to invest in science."
He noted that this cooperation will bring the private sector closer to research and said that, since January 2019, following the guidance of Minister Tereza Cristina, the company has been working hard to strengthen this relationship. "We went from 6% of projects in the portfolio in partnership with the private sector to almost quadrupling, almost 20%."
Minister Marcos Pontes (MCTIC) said that the partnership is "hugely important for the country" and that having a company like Embrapa is a source of great pride for Brazilians. "For all this work that has been done in the development of agribusiness; for everything this represents for the country and for the planet in terms of food security. And this is done through science," he said.
Under the agreement, R﹩ 100 million in reimbursable resources will be allocated for hiring over the next two years. Companies will be able to access the repayable financing line of the Finep Conecta Program, which offers advantageous conditions for companies that invest in Research and Development in partnership with Science and Technology Institutions.
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