Eastern Europe

I said in a Twitter post that the Germans are the masters of process and precision... visiting both the largest tractor manufacturing site in Europe and a large scale agricultural machinery manufacture, along with the parts distribution centres for both confirms that statement as far as I am concerned!

John Deere in Mannheim and Bruschal and Horsch at Schandorf were great hosts to us. We discovered that for John Deere showing buyers and dealers around their factory is their preferred marketing choice - to that end they have 15 tour guides employed and the whole factory is painted up with walking tracks and viewing stations. The distribution machines were something else to this 'logistics ignoramus.'

They use a 'choatic' storage system, which means the machines that find and retrieve parts from the the 24m high by 95m deep shelving units returns parts to any 'address' on the shelf depending on the season, frequency of ordering and where there happens to be space. When that barcoded part is needed again, the machine knows where it was stored last time and the whole process can start over - people are not looking for things at all.

The countryside is beautiful, though our ability to see clearly into the distance was restricted by the hazy air - partly atmospheric and partly the coal that is still being burnt as winter slowly retreats. Our coldest day was in Prague - an overnight low of -3 degrees and the chilliest day following. Otherwise out on the farms we visited we were adequately equipped.

We have even seen three dairies in the midst of all the cropping operations! All three were using pressed effluent to obtain the dry fibre and use as bedding - one used as is, one added strw and the last added lime!

Horsch operate a farm in the Czech Republic, which they are improving and using for farm scale trials - essentially a 3000ha demonstration farm! Huge gear, and huge fields to grow mainly maize, wheat and oilseed rape - we were in fenceless paddocks more than doube the size of Kevin's dairy farm in Ireland! Our cropping trio from Australia along with Baptiste from France were pretty interested - in the crops, the soils, the husbandry and, of course I mustn't forget, the gear!

Prague is magnificent - and hums on weekend nights, when we happened to be there. Complete with fairyland turrets, icons and historic structures (like the Charles Bridge, started in 1357), it was a lovely place to roam around in before heading further east.

We changed tack then to a large farming company called Spearhead, operating in 5 eastern European countries. We visited several of their sites in both the Czech Republic and Poland. Classically they have been able to take on large leases from the coop farms following the fall of communism in this region. Interestingly in Poland they are usually leasing from the State, whereas in the Czech Republic, where land was privatised, they have multiple small leases for each 'farm'. Further they are not just producers, but also processors, onsellers and storers.
Again these people were lovely hosts and we have been plied with both gastronomic and alcoholic local specialties. We were told that the Czech Republic holds the record for beer consumption per capita at 142 litres per annum. Czech pork knuckle, Polish sour soup (in a bread cob!) and Polish dumplings along with red cabbage were a few of the items on our menus.

After our last farm visit it was about a 4 hour trek to Warsaw - for one more night before leaving the northern hemisphere after over a month up there!

The pictures of Warsaw after WW2, compared with how it looks now are almost unbelievable. The place has been reinstated to such a standard that it is now a UNESCO world heritage site. There is more colour in Warsaw than in the other European cities I have seen on this trip. We stayed in the 'old town', surrounded by (rebuilt) walls and towers.

Again, an amazing privilege to be able to build in these 'cultural pauses' between our agricultural visits.
Kenya is our next destination - we are in fact here, about to kick into a very rigorous schedule - owing to the slow driving conditions, our biggest trek will be 6 hours in a few days time! Brace yourself for the next installment!

Washington DC and RULE

Sadly there is no big sign (that I noticed) saying "Welcome to the Czech Republic!"
But here we are as proven by the slot for Czeck Krona in the pay toilet at the service station we just fueled up at...
It feels like a lot has happened since my last blog. We spent over two days in  Washington DC, lost some 'time getting back across the Atlantic, and have now had two days in Germany.
I must say, being asked in a German accent why there is no EU exit stamp in my passport at Frankfurt Airport when we arrived was disconcerting. Fortunately it was just a combination of the beautiful colours in the pages of our NZ passport and a very faint effort on the part of the immigation person in Paris that simply made it hard to find - not missing!

Wahsington DC has lots of sights that are familiar to us if we've watched any movies at all - especially Forest Gump! We were staying quite close to the heart of DC, about 10 minutes walk from the Washington Memorial, which we had the opportunity to wander around on our first afternoon. By popular vote we also went into the Aerospace Museum. It had a great vatiety of themed displays. I enjoyed the perspective of the American Airforce on one of the battles we had found out about in Northern France.

Our purpose in Washington was to link up with a Pennsylvanian leadership group set up as an Extesnion intitaive by Penn State Uni - not just our tour, but the 11 guys doing the 'Brazil Tour' too. Every two years they take about 15 people in places of leadership and infuence and seek to further develop leadership and understanding of agriculture. These folk are not necessarily already involved in agriculture but will have the opportunity to be ag ambassadors in some form.Extension here takes a much wider view than we do in New Zealand.
It was good to have some personal connections with locals over these two days. and I have made a friend in Nadine, my buddy :)

Along the way we heard from a deliciouly humorous international trade consultant ("don't be afraid to tell the emperor [read 'client'] he has no clothes"), an ex Senator (who helped us understand the media portrayal of the USA is the 'federal' version of policy, where individual states may think and enact differently) and a lawyer from the American Farm Bureau ("we need to be thinking about omni-channel communication - and infuence the influencers").

On our first day together as a group, the flags of all the nations represented were in the conference room -each country had to say something about their flag. It was just Ben and I from NZ, so I got to do it. USA was last, and we got a rendition of the Star Spangled Banner, sweetly led by my buddy Nadine, who, along with her family, is heavily involved in theatre! It was a great exercise, for what it offered us Nuffielders in the way of insight to the passion and allegiance to the US flag, and for what we all learned about one another's history and culture.

On the Tuesday, our second day, we had some pretty special engagements. The Under Secretary for Agriculture met us at the historic USDA building (apparently unprecedented access for a large group of 'nobodies') in the Heads of State room. We sat where many internationally significant people have sat and discussed weighty matters!

Next off to Observatory Circle where many of the Embassies are housed - NZ Embassy was difinitely a touch of home. Unfortunately our ambassador Mike Moore was unavailble as there is lots of TPP activity at the moment in Washington DC, but we were given a great summary of  NZ agriculture and our relationship with the USA in that areana by an enthusiastic and experienced trade policy team member, Jason.

The coup d' gras was a light dinner up at the Naval Observatory, where our host and guest speaker was Rear Admiral Craig Faller. He and his wife are one of four top Navy officials that live on the site - along with the Vice President of America. He discussed some of his posts, including as Director of Operations, US Command, and commanding the first US ship to render assistance after the Boxing Day Tsunami. He talked of how his leadership focus has changed over time to being more trust oriented. He spoke in their Library - housing pretty much any book ever written about astronomy, including the works of both Gallileo and Copernicus - and complete with a wee indoor fountain in the middle of the circular room!

I haven't said anything about Eastern Europe yet - that will have to wait until later!