Yaras crop approach, a win-win concept

Yara produces and sells fertilizers to distributors and farmers around the entire world. The ambition, however, is not to just to sell fertilizers but to supply plant nutrition. That is why agronomists assist the sales organisation to identify and supply the plant nutrition solutions that help growers to grow their produce according to needs and demands of the food market.

The right nutrition will contribute to increase the profitability of growers and create a win-win situation beneficial also for Yara as supplier. Yara believes that this approach also contributes to a sustainable development of the agricultural sector since it helps to achieve not only the best crop yield but also the top crop quality required by the grower, the food processor, the distributor of fresh produce and finally the consumer. Yara has developed alliances with the companies Phosyn, SQM and Akzo Nobel in order to provide a complete fertilizer product range fulfilling all needs in the food value chain.

A plant nutrition concept for growers must provide answers to the following questions:

• At which growth stage shall a nutrient be applied to the crop?
• Shall the nutrients be applied in one application or split into several applications?
• What amount of the nutrients shall be applied?
• In which form: dissolved in water (liquid) or as solid particles?
• How to apply the nutrient? Shall solid nutrient particles be place in specific locations near the plants or broadcasted? Shall liquid nutrients be applied with irrigation water (fertigation) or sprayed onto the foliage or fruit?

The first step in the development of a plant nutrition concept, is to screen all available sources of information (scientific literature, nutrition field trials etc.) for existing knowledge on the effect of nutrients on the yield and quality of the crop in question. Each nutrient will impact specific parts of plant physiology and cannot be replaced by another nutrient in that function. This means that the lack of any single nutrient will hinder crop growth even if all other nutrients are fully available. Therefore, a balanced supply of all nutrients is essential to grow healthy crops giving high yields of good quality. If necessary, Yara carries out field trials to generate additional information. The knowledge is used to compile a full nutritional package for the crop. Using this as the basis, the agronomists will compose a balanced nutrition program for the crop based on fertilizer products available.

Often the nutrient or fertilizer recommendations are influenced by the requirements of the different market segments in which the crops are used. As an example, there are at least four potato market segments: chips, crisps, fresh and seed potatoes (Fig. 1). Each segment requires a specific nutrient management program to achieve the quality criteria that have been set by the potato processors.

Communicating the concept to the markets

All Yara’s knowledge about the nutrition of specific crops is efficiently communicated to all parts of the market organization. Several channels are used to convey the information to the sales teams. Comprehensive information is provided through the Yara Plantmasters  (Fig. 2), that were developed for major crops like potatoes, tomatoes, citrus, bananas, wine and apples. Crop workshops are held on a regular basis to introduce the Plantmaster information to the market agronomists. In addition presentations are made as quick updates for the sales organisation.

Growers only buy into a crop nutrition concept if it increases their profitability. That is why the sales organisation needs to fully understand plant nutrition and draw upon agronomic support activities (Fig. 3).  Agronomic support activities in Yara include:

• Demonstration trials
• Presentations in workshops with growers
• Visits to single growers (trial on his field / problem solving)
• Seminars with key plant nutrition advisors
• Information exchange with food processors (they usually have contracts with growers)
• Tools that help diagnose the nutritional status of a crop (e.g. Yara N-Tester)

A crop specific balanced fertilization strategy is a way to ensure a sustainable agriculture that can provide the world population with sufficient food of high quality. All available knowledge about the crop and the environment where it will be cultivated, has to be combined to recommend the right mix of nutrients at the right time. This crop approach generates good returns on the efforts made by those involved and a profitable future for all -  growers, fertilizer distributors and Yara.