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A few days ago the World Agribusiness Management Conference was held in Buenos Aires, with the aim of discussing the opportunities and challenges that the world has to guarantee the production of healthy, accessible, sustainable food in sufficient quantities for the next generations, with you look at 2050.
The congress was organized by the Agribusiness and Food Center of the Austral University and the International Association of Food and Agribusiness Management (IFAMA).

Essence of Argentine agribusiness
Francesco Braga, CEO of IFAMA, spoke about the reason why they chose Argentina as their headquarters and argued: "Because of the great potential of local companies, where the high degree of innovation and disruption that local management has to do agribusiness is demonstrated" , and also, motivated Argentina to develop its maximum potential and be one of the four largest food producers in the world.
In tune with Braga, in this exhibition and exchange space, different national companies related to agriculture shared their experience so that the foreign public knows the essence of agribusiness in Argentina. Such is the case of Marcos Capdepont, Agro Business Manager who spoke about how YPF went from selling fuel to selling goods and services to Argentine farmers, and about innovation in products and services as a key driver of competitiveness.
In a dialogue with AgrofyNews, Capdepont referred to the growth milestones of YPF Directo, and highlighted: "Until last year it was the infrastructure, to build 105 original bases in unique places, it was a titanic job, a very large investment US $ 250 million and now, comes the great challenge that is the connection, a network does not work but is connected, but can share its great successes and failures to learn and move forward".
Then, they talked about how you can innovate in organizations and in doing business. As an example, the case of Grupo Los Grobo was presented. Its president, the renowned agricultural entrepreneur, Gustavo Grobocopatel, before an audience more international than national, said: "Los Grobo has marked a before and an after in Argentina, the actions have preceded the strategies, then spend time to understand why the We were doing".
It is a company that follows a network model with partners and suppliers, in which the center is the producer. In this sense, Grobocopatel confessed: "My great dilemma in these years has been how to facilitate the flows of knowledge and capital towards the organization".
When asked by AgrofyNews what agribusinesses should focus on in Argentina, it was clear and precise: "On the one hand, what has to do with the technological convergence between biotechnology, robotics, nanotechnology and chemistry; with the development of network value chains; With the integration to the world and the sustainability of our operations both socially and environmentally, they are all different things that must be done in a systemic way".
The younger and disruptive companies also had their space. So much so, that Maximiliano Landrein, founder and CEO of Agrofy, shared his experience at IFAMA about the impact of electronic commerce on agribusiness, considering that Agrofy is an online market for agriculture, in which, suppliers and producers of the agro come together to do business in all categories of the sector.
Recalculating the producer's training area
Data that went to the center of the scene during the IFAMA Congress, were the results of the Survey on the Needs of the Argentine Agricultural Producer (ENPA), presented by the Agribusiness and Food Center of the Austral University.
In this regard, Professor Bernardo Piazzardi, and director of the Investment Agency of Santa Fe, summarized the results and highlighted: "The Argentine field is no longer the same as the one of the last 20 years. The business model changed towards a vertical integration model where alliances between companies will be essential".
According to said, those who make decisions within companies are younger and more educated than the generations that preceded them, and another relevant fact is that 70% of respondents say they plan to make investments in the next five years.
Faced with this diagnosis and in dialogue with Agrofy News, Piazzardi, by way of reflection, asked: "Is the entire network that surrounds the producer, banks, suppliers of supplies, services, consulting, machinery ready and the Government is ready to accompany that change of the country's main currency provider?".
When asked about the areas of training, he warned: "We must take into account that they have a strictly productive technical education, and the driver of a business sometimes does not go through the productive but sometimes it is necessary to have a good marketing strategy , risk management and financing. These big, well-educated young decision makers do a little water on that or they need assistance".
Pushing the country
During a meeting with the press, Ana Galiano, Dean of the Faculty of Business Sciences of the Austral University, expressed the interest of the academy to provoke a dialogue table that includes national, provincial and private sector authorities, with the objective of to develop strategic and long-term public policies that help turn the country into the true supermarket of the world.
For his part, Héctor Laurence, the Argentine who was formally appointed International President of IFAMA, said that "for the next three years will aim to lead the organization with a great goal: that there is quality food, accessible and sustainable production for a projected population with 10,000 million people by the year 2050".
Regarding the challenges that Argentina has in terms of management of agribusiness and food production, he explained: "Working for the development of agribusiness, which is approximately 40% of Argentina's GDP, is very important for the creation of employment, social inclusion and the country's wealth, "and explained that" the take-off of the sector will help the country to fulfill the role that is expected globally from it and that is one of the largest producers of food of humanity".
The Congress was attended by more than one hundred national and international leaders, leaders of the public and private, scientific, academic and student sectors globally and the next IFAMA Conference will be in the Chinese city of Guangzhou in 2019. In turn, it highlight that the main conclusions of IFAMA will be reflected in a final document that will be delivered to the G20 leaders who will meet in Argentina at the end of November.
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Published by: www.agrofy.com.ar
Automatic translation from spanish.