Development plan:
Leu Agro plans in short the following development plan for the project laid out in the previous writing. As the project is of large size it will not be possible to start all projects at the same time, with this we are planning on starting with one 50’000 ha initial startup farm that will serve as a model project / farm and will be the base and guideline for the expansion projects. With this we will have an initial farm that can serve as well as test outlet to roll out all the knowhow and technologies to the future farms. The other projects are laid out in a development plan that extends to 2030 to complete on the planed and offered projects above.
Land Accessibility:
Gaining accessibility to lands in these regions is important for us, and for this Leu-Agro has devised a strategy. The land in these regions will be, by site purchase, rented or leased for an extensive time period, until the first opportunity arises for the land to be purchased or taken over. Buy outs and registration of existing non registered payee land from the shareholders of existing collective farms is also being considered as an important option. Other land owners in financial difficulties or ones who do not take care of the their land holdings will be tempted to become shareholders of farming companies with their land being part of the shareholder structure, we believe such an option poses an interesting offer to existing land owners. As far as equipment is concerned, the old equipment will be best left to outdated farms, as we plan to purchase latest state of the art agriculture equipment with the latest technologies included.
Farming Techniques and Technology:
Among our core competencies is a clear picture of technologies and capacities needed for successful large scale farming operation in the Black Earth Soil Region of the Russian Federation. First and foremost, all land at our disposal will be cut short from production for the startup year, to implement a cleanup process as well as leveling the fields and taking care of the weed pressure that exists in most areas of central Russia. During the land development process, approximately 40-50% of our land will be used for Winter Wheat, while the rest will be used for following year‘s spring crop. Heavy Disc, soil restructuring and leveling equipment will be allocated for this work.
Once the initial program is implemented, stage two with the second crop year program will make use of No-Till practice to successfully enable us to make savings in production cost from second year onwards. Such farming practices will deploy the most efficient, productive and economical production process possible under the circumstances. GPS and Auto-Steer equipment will be used from startup to solve any and all issues with expensive overlapping fieldwork.
With the use of soil scanner we will produce from the first seeding operation a scan of any and all fields, for future variable rate application of seed and fertilizer. This will be supported by combine yield mapping and soil testing. Farm Grain storage will be used for storage of grain, aeration bins and dryer setup will support the harvest operation. With good storage we will be able to produce in early stage of the business high quality grain for the domestic and international market.
Workforce:
In conclusion, Leu Agro brings extensive know how of farming in the Black Earth Region to the business, and has the following plan for development of management and labor force; The Russian farming sector is in need of high quality specialists to support the operation and development. To train local management on the cluster level (Farms), we plan on bringing in agronomy, engineering and general technologies specialist to support the daily activities. Any and all special production and vertical integrated business segments will be supported as needed by western specialist. The local work force and management will need to manage the local operation and businesses with the support of segment specialist. It is our plan to train local specialist locally, as well with international travel and training. Our workforce will be the key factor for success and we are planning on treating this with the highest level of respect for the future development, so we can attract the local specialist to stay in the agriculture business and look at Leu Agro as a great work place with future carrier possibilities. In region‘ with low labor force and in remote areas we are planning on offering local temporary housing and transportation services to bring in employees from further distances for seasonal / temporary and full time work.