Our new Channel Development Director in Brazil, Rick Nelson, attended the World Agri Tech South American Summit on June 28-29, 2022. Gathering experts from across the world, this event focuses on catalysing the Latin American Agri-Business transition toward more sustainable food supply chain management.
As explained in our previous post, direct sales are not the most cost-effective route to reach cooperatives and other Farmforce users in strategic locations such as LATAM. With this in mind, Rick will be on the lookout for Brazil-based Farmforce resellers. On the other hand, he will also connect with coops, multinational corporations (MNCs), non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and startups to highlight the capabilities of our food traceability software in Brazil.
“There are so many startups here in Brazil that they’re trying new things, discovering new opportunities, and that’s why this summit is so important, as we’re going to discuss those things.”
Rick Nelson, Farmforce
Brainstorming with potential partners on the application of our data-driven agtech innovation at the farm level, Rick will raise awareness of how crucial the first mile is to achieve production traceability and sustainability in the food supply chain.
“Like everyone at Farmforce, I’m passionate about food´s first mile. I’m fully aligned with the company mission: providing agtech players with more farm-level data to make smarter decisions and keep up with ever-stringent sustainability requirements,” Rick said.
So, why focus on Brazil?
We’ll let the country numbers speak for us:
- Accounting for 40% of the total agriculture & cattle raising in Latin America;
- Being the 2nd largest producer of soybeans in the world;
- Producing ⅓ of the planet’s oranges.
Besides being the world’s fourth-largest food producer, 70% of Brazil’s food comes from small farms. These often fail to adopt sustainable farming techniques, thus using toxic fertilisers, achieving poor yields, and driving deforestation. Along with cattle raising, soybean farming accounts for over two-thirds of Brazil’s Amazon loss. Ironically, a new study found that deforestation will bite into soybean yield. For this reason, Brazil could harness our forest-friendly software for farm management to mitigate its food supply chain risks.
“It’s not only about the Amazon rainforest, there are other biomes we need to protect.”
Rick Nelson, Farmforce
Aside from streamlining the country’s food supply chain traceability, Farmforce matches Brazil’s crop diversity. And that’s because our supply chain management software as a service (SaaS) can cater to perennial, semi-perennial, and annual crops.
Leveraging the food tech congress intel, Rick aims to gain insights on opportunities, pain points, and unmet needs in the Brazilian agricultural scene. In particular, he will contribute to the broader discussion on the following topics:
- Online Marketplaces (e.g., performance vs brick-and-mortar retail, potential economic benefits for smallholder farmers (i.e., unleashing new markets and therefore increasing sales);
- Digital Transformation (e.g., adoption of smart tools like AI, machine learning, satellite imagery, and remote sensors and how they could help growers mitigate climate risks while increasing their income);
- Rural Connectivity (although Farmforce has the flexibility of working offline, the development of 4G and 5G networks in rural areas will supercharge our supply chain visibility software effectiveness);
- Collaboration & Partnerships (in one word, interoperability, a theme that Farmforce is already fostering along the farm-to-fork value chain).
Tapping into this knowledge, our mission is to fine-tune our agricultural supply chain software and help Brazilian agri-business meet its ESG targets.
“Here in Brazil, companies are very eager to understand real strategies to move forward with the ESG agenda. Besides being pressured by their customers, they’re trying to differentiate their brands,” Rick said.