Farmer's Weekly (South Africa)
The right price?
Who knows what the right price is for any given product for sale on a fresh produce market?
It’s certainly not as simple as saying that what a buyer pays is the right price. The reason for this is that market prices are determined by numerous factors, some of which cannot be changed, while others can definitely be controlled.
I cannot, of course, list all these factors here, but I’d like to consider two of them.
VOLUME
The first factor influencing price is volume. You could even say this is the key factor. If someone enters a market and buys a single pocket of potatoes, rest assured that he or she will pay a premium. Some markets refer to a purchaser like this as a retail buyer.
Should a second buyer purchase 10 pallets of the same potatoes, the price per pocket will be substantially less than that paid by the single buyer. This is perfectly normal in business; the single buyer is not being ‘punished’.
Some, not all, salespeople are indifferent to the retail buyer and will even load the price for a single item sale, arguing that a purchase like this is a nuisance and does not contribute enough to turnover to warrant the effort involved in the sale.
It’s human nature to want to write up big sales all the time, because the amount of work in selling a large order and a single item is virtually the same. However, the essence of a market is that it caters for all, so impatient salespeople simply have to get used to it.
did you damage the crop in the first 200m, but you also missed out on the potential yield increase on the rest of the field.
Compound fertiliser
Essentially, there are two major types of finishing technologies used in fertiliser production: prilling and granulation. Prilling produces a pure nutrient product whereas granulation needs binding agents added to the process.
More important to the success of your fertiliser application than anything else is the difference between blends and compounds. Blended fertiliser has shown nitrogen distribution that differs as much as 25% across the width of the spreading pattern. This is caused by density differences and segregation. Compounds eliminate this issue,
as every particle is identical in nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and sulphur ratio.
With companies like Yara now starting to distribute their finished products locally, you can include your micronutrient requirement with the compound or in a coated form with their ProCote technology. This ensures optimal coverage and none of the segregation risks that blends have.
When we speak about applying the right rate at the right place, the consistency of the product being applied is just as important as the applicator and the precision prescription.
Precision
The only outstanding element to discuss is the precision spreader.
Amazone recently added a solution to its line-up that simplifies the task of precision spreading. As an alternative to the more common hydraulic shutter actuation found on the entry-level ZA-V fertiliser spreaders, Amazone now offers the EasySet 2 in-cab terminal that enables electric shutter operation at the push of a button. The operation is completely electric and therefore no additional hydraulic connections are required.
The simplified EasySet 2 in-cab terminal does not require menu navigation to adjust settings on