Bayer gets its facts right
They neither sell fertiliser nor advise on its use, but nevertheless six staff from Bayer CropScience have trained and qualified for the Fertiliser Advisers Certification and Training Scheme (FACTS), in a pilot project designed to widen the knowledge base of the company’s agronomists and technical managers.
The successful candidates include agronomists involved in the company’s development trials, the manager of Bayer’s development farms, and a member of the field team.
"Because it’s not a core requirement, it’s quite unusual to see anyone with a FACTS qualification working for crop protection manufacturers," points out Mike Read, field trials group manager for Bayer. "But voluntary measures like these offer those involved in agriculture the opportunity to demonstrate that they can not only provide detailed nutrient management advice, but also manage - and understand - the increasing environmental pressures on the industry.
"In this day and age, we can’t afford to consider crop protection, nutrient management, soil science as separate issues for dedicated advisers. We think it’s important to understand the interactions between different disciplines and consider a crop’s requirements in a fuller context.
"Moreover, it is all part of our drive to make our staff better qualified.
We’ll support anyone who chooses to increase their knowledge and understanding with this type of recognised course."
Ben Giles, a commercial technical manager with Bayer, signed up to FACTS so that he could boost his working knowledge of crop nutrition. "Most of what I knew previously about fertilisers and nutrition had been picked up from farmers and customers, in my day-to-day work, so I felt it was a subject I needed to know more about, in a more structured fashion.
"About three-quarters of the FACTS course content was new to me, so it’s been tremendously useful in strengthening my grasp of nutrition issues. One can’t know everything about crop science, but the FACTS qualification to add to BASIS has allowed me to put much more into context.
"It’s changed the way I work with customers, as I can talk to them at the same level."
