July 11, 2013

Brazil faces post-harvest loss due to insufficient storage

Corn and soy farmers in Mato Grosso, Brazil have experienced a 10% post-harvest loss, partially due to a lack of storage.

A research project used Geographic Information System (GIS) software to map the coordinates of commercial, cooperative and private grain storage facilities in Mato Grosso. They focused on capacity greater than 50,000 tonnes, mapping the state's 2,143 registered warehouses.

"We created GIS coordinates for every facility, mapped them, and then overlaid how much the production there currently is and how much production there would be if farmers were to produce and store a second corn crop on 100% of the bean crop, in order to find the areas that had the most congestion and the least congestion," said University of Illinois agricultural economist Peter Goldsmith.

"There is a 34% under capacity of soy storage, and the situation is aggravated by the rapidly increasing production of second-crop corn. The state of Mato Grosso is the largest state producing soy in the world. It produces 38% of Brazil's soy and an increasingly greater percentage of corn. It's also the number one state in Brazil for rice, cattle, and cotton. One region in the northern part of the state is about 6.9 million tonnes under capacity. That's 270 million bushels. If a typical grain bin holds about 50,000 bushels, that's equivalent to 5,420 50,000-bushel grain bins."

Goldsmith said that the information will help determine the best, most convenient locations for additional storage. According to Goldsmith, losses occur in three areas--grain that's left standing in the field after a harvest, during the short haul when grain falls off of the truck in transportation from the field to either storage or commercial sale; and loss of private storage.

"Short-haul loss is fairly trivial in the United States but it is significant in developing countries where there is no infrastructure, no paved roads. And the roads that are paved are full of potholes and in very poor condition. Commercial trucks used for hauling grain are not in the best shape so there's a 3% loss of grain that falls off the truck."

The nature of non-stop, year-round farming in the tropics contributes to the loss. "There are also significant quality and direct-gain/loss issues due to harvesting at very high-moisture levels. And the urgency brought on by the seasonal timing makes harvesting go very fast. Speed is important because you've got to get the beans out to get the corn in. A farmer might sacrifice soy to get the corn planted. And the equipment is in constant demand and kept far from the farmstead so the combines and trucks don't get maintained properly," he added.

Goldsmith said that tropical regions of the globe will be producing more and more of the world's food so helping farmers in developing countries such as Brazil to create more efficient harvesting, transporting, and storage is a step toward ensuring that there will be enough grain to feed and fuel the world.

Places like Mato Grosso are at the margin where the food gap can be closed. In most temperate regions of the world, grain productivity is already high so increasing output to meet rising demand is more incremental. The big changes are happening in the low latitude regions of South America and Africa. As a scientifically relevant university, we need to understand the tremendous changes under way in the global agribusiness scene, which currently happens to be in western Brazil.