1. Creating Long-Term
Value in the Industry
2. Looking through the Archives
3. Science and
Agriculture
4. Examples of Misinformation
5. News from South Africa
6. Contributions
1. Creating Long-Term Value In The Industry
Contributed by Paul Benson, Ontario, Canada
In any well established industry, the only source of value to participants
comes from the end-user of the products. Their purchase dollars pay everyone’s
bills, and provide the profit due to anyone who participates in providing that
product in a professional, customer-focused manner.
There may be short-term opportunities for profit by some participants in the
chain prior to the industry reaching a stable, consistent, and productive
level, but these opportunities are most likely transitory. For example a
breeder market develops, typically using investor capital, until volume
production is achieved.
Similarly, there may be “fire sale” pricing as some participants exit the
industry and others address production and quality issues. These types of
opportunity are unlikely to enhance the value of industry products as seen by
the retail customer, and may indeed put them off purchasing (too much
uncertainty).
In assessing value, the customer is likely looking for quality, value,
consistency and availability of product.
If everyone involved is focused on enhancing final customer value, the customer
recognizes it and the size of the industry “pie” grows exponentially.
Problems occur when any one part of the chain operates without providing any
additional value, or acts in a way that reduces value. Examples might be
aggressive trading of poor quality product and dumping it on unsuspecting
customers. Other “value leaks” occur when either availability or quality is
unpredictable, or one portion of the chain takes profits disproportionate to
their contribution (“starving out” other effective participants).
Examples of these problems abound in agricultural history in many countries and
continue today! The challenge lies in learning from them and reducing or
avoiding similar practices. The value chain is really only as strong as the
weakest link. Overall strength requires partnerships based on mutual respect
and understanding.
Delighting your customers and looking out for everyone in the industry is the
best policy for building a loyal customer base and growing the industry into a
competitive presence in the food production environment.
Concentrate on building you own strengths as professionals in agro-business,
but also support your business partners in achieving a win-win result for your
customers. The results will repay your efforts handsomely, as the ultimate
value delivered grows exponentially, and your share will reflect that
growth.
Good luck with the development of an effective, responsible, and sustainable
industry!
Together we Grow - Fragmented we Flounder
2. Looking through the Archives - Who is Burying their heads in
the Sand?
The primary reason given for wanting to join the World Ostrich Association is
to communicate and learn as much as possible about our industry.
Newsletter No. 24 (http://www.world-ostrich.org/member/news24.htm)
asked the question "Do we have an Industry". The answer
was very clearly NO, but we do have tremendous potential if all the factors
that are discussed through these newsletters are understood.
Newsletter 25 (http://www.world-ostrich.org/member/news25.htm)
started looking through the archives. The purpose is to demonstrate how
many factors have been discussed and identified years ago, but for some reason
the people investing in our potential industry appear to "bury their heads
in the sand" and do nothing to address the factors that have to be
corrected. In February 2002, James Dunn from Denmark sent a long message
to the Blue Mountain Ostrich List. A few quotes:
Quote: "I have been working with Ostrich
since 1990. The Ostrich industry in Denmark was like a huge tidal wave. There
were rumours of something big coming, when it hit Denmark, it hit with full
force and within an incredibly short time span there were over 500 Ostrich
farms established. Prices soared to fantastic heights and fell again. In the
wake of this receding tidal wave there are around 100 farmers still hanging on.
The same picture has repeated itself many times in many different countries.
It is almost as if the same script was used over and over again. I am
very puzzled and perplexed over this. Why have we all made the same
mistakes?
Why are we still making the same mistakes? Has the industry made any kind
of progress since the beginning?
When I look at what topics are discussed on the list I am in serious doubt that
this industry will be anything more than a hobby or cottage industry.
If this industry is to grow and prosper and become a self supporting way of
life, there are many problems that must be addressed by the industry itself.
This will require that the industry works together on a world-wide basis or at
the very least on a national basis. There are very big questions that must be
answered and problems to be addressed and solved. This can not be done on a
individual basis. Before the industry learns to work together as an industry,
nothing will be done to advance the industry as a whole".
End Quote
James' words are totally accurate and this is still going on, with new
countries coming into Ostrich production. With all the evidence that this
is happening, why are the same mistakes continually being made?
WOMRAD addresses these issues and provides solutions
3. Science and Agriculture
Agriculture has made dramatic changes over the past 50 years, crop yields and
livestock yields have consistently reduced their costs of production through
increasing yields. These have been achieved by a combination of improved
inputs resulting in improvements in crop and livestock health and intensive
standards of farm management including plant and animal breeding
programs. These developments have been aided by the scientific
community, with most progressive developments starting with the progressive
producers, often working in partnership with the academic community and supply
company scientists.
One of the reasons the mistakes discussed above has been replicated over and
over again with ostrich is due to the way the scientific community continually
reference other scientists work. It is assumed that the factors written
are proven and have worked when it can now be seen very clearly that this is
not true. Research in Ostrich production is new, the real work only started in
the late 80's. One scientist told me a few years ago that over 80% of the
worlds ostriches are influenced by his work. That is a clue that an error
in information, when continually replicated is resulting in poor performance
and failure to develop an industry.
An example to illustrate this point:
Evaluation of Metabolizable Energy Levels in Diets for Ostrich Chicks during
Functional Formation of the Digestive Tract, V.I. Turevich, (Lemek Company, Moscow) and V.I Fisinin (All Russian Research and Technology Institute of Poultry)
Quote: "Ostrich after 6 months of
age excels broiler in effectiveness of ME extractions from
concentrates." End quote. The values are then
listed and the reference is Cilliers 1995.
This paper is published on page 291 of “The Proceedings of World Ostrich
Congress, Warsaw, Poland”.
This comes from a study well known to all of us and referenced in many papers
relating to Ostrich production. The results of this study were gained
using faecal analysis. Using faecal analysis as a method of determination
was documented by a number of researchers as early as 1981 as providing
misleading results. This study was carried out in 1994/95, more than 10
years later. The reason faecal analysis provides misleading results is
that it does not account for variables in diets that influence nutrient
utilisation of different ingredients.
The following words of John Humphrys, a British broadcaster who was also a
Dairy farmer, are worthy of note in this discussion:
Quote: "Science is simply knowledge
acquired by study. It is nothing more than that and nothing less.
It is a powerful force and it is open to every single one of us with an
enquiring mind to engage in it. It helps to have training. It helps
even more to have research support and resources. But none of that is
essential". End quote
The science of livestock production has many elements working
together. It is a combination of:
- Nutrition
- Feed Management
- Farm Management
- Genetics
John went onto say:
Quote: “Knowledge may be acquired by sitting in
a laboratory and looking through a microscope and learning from it.
Equally it may be acquired by sitting on a farm gate, studying the way grass
grows and learning from that. It may be the ability to read a map of the
human genome and explain it. It may be the ability to red the way a pig
behaves with her litter and explain why. It is not the ability to
experiment with different molecules and create a powerful pesticide any more
than it is the ability to experiment with different rotations of crops to
create a bigger harvest.
We say that a man is a scientist if he has studied at university and is now
engaged in transferring genes from one specie to another to create a superior
plant. But do not say the same of a man who has studied plants as a
humble gardener all his life and learned to cross breed from one variety of
plant to another to achieve similar results. He is still just a
gardener. The real difference is that one will certainly have letters
after his name and the word ‘Doctor’ in front of it. The other will not.
The Blind Worshipers tell us that without ‘science’ as they narrowly define the
word there would be no progress. Yet modern agriculture began more than
ten thousand years ago. How many laboratories were there then? The
answer is, of course, that there were thousands upon thousands of them.
Every enclosed and cultivated patch of ground was a laboratory. Every
seed sown was an experiment. If the first primitive man who spotted the
effect of animal dung on the growth of his plants and managed to repeat the
effect was not a scientist, then what was he? He acquired
knowledge. He discovered fertiliser. He proved that a plant was
able to thrive with it and would fail without it.
He may not have known why it worked but his descendants found out and learned
how to create compost and apply that to their crops. They acquired
knowledge. They learned that certain insects were beneficial and should
be encouraged and others were not and should be deterred and they found ways of
keeping them under some sort of control. In what sense were they
different from a man in a white coat who sits in his laboratory and manipulates
molecules to create poisons to kill insects?”
End quote
He went onto discuss during the research of the book "The Great Food
Gamble", that he had spoken to one of Britain’s most distinguished
biologists who confessed to him that he had been teaching his students
something for thirty years that turned out to be wrong. It had been scientific
dogma – unquestioned in a thousand learned papers – until it was
overturned. Progress is made rewriting text books as we develop.
Take time to read the papers on offer, and not simply the abstract or
summary. Check the references; never assume that the facts contained are
correct. Check that the author of papers has interpreted the findings of
the referenced paper accurately; check that the referenced paper did in fact
prove the facts being referenced. Check that the paper is consistent in
information throughout.
Remember "science is simply knowledge acquired by study".
That form of study can come in a number of different ways and has to when
applied to livestock production as there are many factors that influence
results.
Research and Training are an important
component of WOMRAD
4. Examples of Misinformation
Over the years we have heard many statements made about ostrich that bear no
relevance to the true facts. Discussing just a few of these factors again
helps to explain why we do not yet have an industry.
BREED MYTHS
· The skin from reds produces better leather
· Zimbabwean Blues are better producers than Namibian Blues.
· Italian African Black - New Generation
· Blues Lay Less Eggs than Blacks
· Blacks Producer Higher Value Skins
· Reds are Aggressive
· All South African Blacks are superior birds to other breeds.
· The Red Neck Ostrich breed are poor egg producers
There have been many statements
made about the different breeds, but too few meaningful records to substantiate
them. There are currently tremendous variations in skins as a
result of different production methods, different ages and different storage
methods. Without meaningful records tracked right through to tanning,
with all variables eliminated all those references to one breed or another
being better are purely hypothetical and usually made to support the sale of
the particular breed being sold.
Poorer egg production has been attributed to Blues and Reds. Item 3, in
Newsletter #25 "Are you setting you Goals high enough" (http://www.world-ostrich.org/member/news25.htm)
discussed the severe egg production problems and the clear evidence of
malnutrition in breeders. When their dietary levels are falling severely
short, the larger the bird the greater their dietary needs for body
maintenance. It has been proved many times that once the dietary levels
are high enough, Reds and Blues can lay as many eggs as good performing Blacks.
PRODUCTION MYTHS
· Ostrich do not put on muscle after 10months of Age, only fat
· Birds have to be slaughtered after 12 months of age or the follicles are not mature on the skins
· Birds do not produce Black Feathers before 12 months of Age
· 95kgs is the Optimum Live Weight for a Slaughter Bird
The first statement was made
during a presentation at the Scientific Conference in Oudtshoorn in 1998.
If Ostrich are only laying down fat after 10 months of age, then the rations
and management systems are falling short. This information has been assumed to
be correct and rations have formulated in the belief this is the case. We
have seen Post-Finisher rations. These rations are formulated to hold the
birds between the assumed finishing time and slaughter because the birds are
believed to need holding back to 14 months for a quality skin.
I have proven to myself, and so have others, that you can slaughter birds at 7
months onwards, achieve birds of improved weights and acceptable skins.
To maintain birds to 14 months requires double the feed, longer investment time
in working capital, greater labour and more infrastructure. If for any
reason a later slaughter date is used, then the birds can achieve good muscle
development, dependent on genetics, during those months.
Many of us have seen birds starting to produce their black feathers from as
early as 35 weeks – Note black feathers developing behind the wing on the 35
week old slaughter chick in Figure 1.
Figure 1 - 35 Week Old Slaughter Chick
The optimum slaughter weight depends on your own particular
market conditions and economic condition. It makes sense to put on as much
muscle as possible in the given time. The market has indicated that it
prefers the larger muscled birds.
The right Liveweight is also dependent on whether the Liveweight is made up of
good muscle growth (meat production) or fat. Our chairman has slaughtered
birds for others with a live weight in excess of 120kgs, but meat production
was no more than 24kgs. This low yield of meat is uneconomic to process.
We will cover a few more statements of misinformation that have been
circulating next month.
5. News from South Africa
A press release was published on the SOABC web site this month. http://www.saobc.co.za/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=46
The press release discusses the completion of the investigative phases
of the Ostrivision-project. The press release concludes with the
following statement:
Quote: “We have to bear in mind that
Ostrivision is a long term project that requires new ways of thinking and
doing”, Kruger said. End
quote
This quote indicates that there is finally recognition by the South African
industry that new ways of doing things need to be looked at. The next
question to ask is "will they take the correct route"? There
will have to be major changes if they are to become competitive with other
livestock specie.
Worthy of note in this discussion is the fact that the WOA principles have
always encouraged modern and ethical livestock production principles to ensure
our members can operate in a profitable manner.
6. Contributions
As always, I ask for contributions from Country Liaisons and other members. A sharing of your experiences, what is happening in your area - anything you believe that would be of interest to other members. Any contributions for inclusion in future news letters please send to Fiona at [email protected].
Any comments or suggestions, please post either to the members list [email protected] or Craig at [email protected]
Ask not only what the WOA can do for you but also what you can do for the WOA.
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