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Arrived home on Friday after a few long days of driving, areoplanes and airports. Good to come home to lots of green grass and fat cows. Renee has done such as good job I will have to go away more often. Now I need to start planning for my individual study program, which at this stage I will head off in July.

Superstars

When we arrived at one of our visits this week we became a bit suspicious as soon as we pulled up. It didn't take long to realise we were out numbered nearly 2 to 1. Bayer Crop Science, who had coordinated a lot of the visits had organised some PR work and had brought along the TV and newspaper to do some articles. Dave and Steve stood up to the task, although they were pushed in the right direction. The next morning in the lift at the motel this random bloke turns to Steve and says 'You are from Australia aren't you, I just saw you on TV' . Good on You Fellas - hopefully the interpreter got the message right and you did Australia proud. Maybe if I had my Aussie shorts on they would have picked me?

Brazilia

Brazil are the second largest producer of Soya Beans in the world. It seems to be the preferred crop to grow here as the export market is quite strong compared to corn. In the last 20 years production has tripled and the area sown has only increased by 5%. This is quite impressive and is largely due to new varieties and no till. One farm we visited was cropping 4700 ha. 4000ha was Soya beans and of the 4000ha, 90% was GM. The other was corn and beans.

This photo is at a research station 'Embrapa'. They are running a project that covers exactly my topic. There is quiet a bit of interest here in intergrating livestock and cropping systems. This project has also added forestry into the mix. They are basically doing what we call Alley farming. The trees in the background are 2 years old and will be harvested when they are 5 yr old.

Yesterday was a good day for me. Highly relevant to what we do at home and my study topic as well. This is a crop of Pioneer Hybrid Seed Corn. Similar to our system - 2 male rows and 4 females. Only difference is they have 100ha not 15 like me. Detassling is still done by hand (over 100 people). Opportunities like this are possible when labour is cheap I guess.

The sunsets on Brazil today and we are off to Uraguay for the last leg of our Global Focus Program. Brazil has been fantastic, probably my favourite country so far. Last night we had dinner at the Residence of the Australia Embassy with the First Secretary and the Australia Ambassador Neil Mules. You have to pinch yourself at times like this and just realise how lucky we are to have opportunities such as this through Nuffield.

The 5 C's

So far Brazil has been all about the 5 things starting with the letter C. Coffee, Corn, Cattle, Chickens and Cane (Sugar). Yesterday we spent the morning at Daterra coffee farm. A large coffee producer with a great business model that really looked after their staff and produce. Today we visited a sugar cane mill and inspected some cane plantings. Imagine sowing and harvesting 14000 acres by hand. Then off to a chicken farm. Reasonably big (killing 200 000 birds a day) making them only the 44th? in size in the country. They use 600t of corn each day and 200t of Soy meal. We are all blown away by the scale of things here. Good to see another country competing on a free market though as we do. No subsidies like US and UK. Hopefully see some Soya beans harvesting tomorrow on our way up to Brazilia.

The Brazilian Bus

We have travelled over 1000 kms in the last 2 days in this machine. As soon as we got in at the airport we knew we were in for a rough ride. We found it very difficult to translate to the driver who spoke no English that his suspension was stuffed. Upon further investigation we discovered a busted airbag. Then tonight after wondering why we were getting some minor road rage from the other motorists, we realized he had no low beams on the headlights. I think we have seen the last of it tonight and getting a change over tomorrow otherwise we will be off to the chiropractor for 7 back crunches later in the week.

On a positive note we have seen some amazing countryside on our pilgrimage up to Goianna. Lots of crops, cattle and coffee. Will keep u posted

Sao Paulo

Am currently in Brazil and apparently so is my luggage however I have not seen it for a few days. I have told them to hold it at the airport and will pick it up next week. Language is a bit of a barrier here as my Portuguese is very limited.
This is salted fish. Not that keen but I suppose I will try it. Seems to be popular over here but so is steak. Food is fairly cheap.

We are loving the fruit over here especially after being in the US were it is not part of their diet. Went to the market yesterday and taste tested some exotic fruits I have not had before.

Looks like hard work but this is a common sight

The Domino effect! Sao Paulo has nearly 20 million people. To help with peak hour traffic they restrict you to 4 days a week driving based on your number plate.

Pyramids

Sightseeing this afternoon - Apparently they have pyramids in Mexico. Although I have not been to Egypt they were impressive.

View from the top of the first one we climbed.
We have not done any work or not even anything physical for nearly a month now. We were all puffing by the time we got to the top. (Actually we did go Ten pin bowling yesterday).
Told you helmets were optional!
Team photo at the top. Conquered Mexico - Brazil here we come.