By Tisha Steyn

Cereal, vegetable and fruit farmers in the Overberg cannot stop talking about the advantages that Timac Agro’s plant nutritional and other products holds for them. Many farmers attended the first Timac Agro information day at Kam’Bati on the shores of the Breede River near Swellendam.

Roullier

Timac Agro South Africa is an affiliate of the French mother company, Roullier. The head office of the Roullier group is in St Malo, France, where Daniel Roullier, founder of the Group, owns a centre of 8 000 m²  where intensive research is undertaken to develop the Roullier specialist products.

In the head office facility 400 scientists and engineers have been working for the past 57 years to develop the outstanding speciality products in adherence to the Roullier high standards.

“The success of the Roullier – consequently also the Timac Agro products – depends on meticulous research,” said Francois Wolfaardt, marketing manager of Timac Agro South Africa, during the information day. “The advanced technical quality of the products puts them head and shoulders above other conventional products available in the market place.”

The Roullier definition of plant nutrition is the availability of nuclear trace elements in sufficient amounts, in the correct equation, and in a form that makes it available for uptake by the plant, and which will then enable the plant to deliver a maximum yield.

Timac Agro SA

Timac Agro started trading in South Africa three years ago and has already established a firm foothold in the Northern Provinces. In 2016/17 it also expanded to six regions in the Western Cape. The Timac Agro head office is in Centurion and the main distribution centre for its products is in Cape Town.

“Timac Agro’s 80 employees, including 50 technical marketers, are in the employ of Roullier,” says Jandré van der Westhuizen, Timac Agro’s director of development. “Training is important: new marketers undergo an intensive training course to get to grips with the projects, and also do practical field work training.”

“There are approximately 250 commercial farmers in the Southern Cape – an area stretching from Wellington to Knysna on the Garden Route, as well as into the Little Karoo, constituting an important market for Timac Agro.”

“The Southern Cape region is the biggest producer of barley in South Africa, while one third of the country’s sheep are found here,” says Francois.

Other crops are winter cultivated plants such as wheat, barley, oats, canola, lupin, coriander and presently also peas, as well as summer crops such as maize for silage-making and a little soy; Further also the production of vegetables and vegetable seed, as well as fruit such as grapes, peaches, plums, apricots, tomato plums, apples and pears, as well as citrus such as oranges, nartjies and lemons.

Products

During the information day a special focus fell on the D-Coder product, but reference was also made to Fertiactyl, Fertileader and Maxifruit, as well as Calseabloc licks for livestock and game.

D-Coder is an interactive green pellet which stimulates all four growing processes of a plant – settling, vegetative development, flowering phase and production.

“Successful production depends on the health of the soil and that is what ensures sustainable harvests,” explains Francois.

Soil fertility is determined by the physical, chemical and biological balance of the soil. The green pellets of the D-Coder, which are loaded with nutrients, are placed in the root zone where the plant can best utilise it. The plant “fetches” the nutrients when it needs them for germination, root development, vegetative growth and optimal production.

Fertiactyl is a liquid tension regulator which is applied during the plant’s early development. It is applied in the plant furrow or through the irrigation system. This product stimulates root development to enable the plant to find the nutrients and absorb all the nutrients during critical growing phases to promote photo synthesis and guarantees that the plant experience sustained strong growth.

Fertileader is also a liquid stress regulator which is applied at a later stage as a foliage dressing. It helps the plant to withstand stress and promotes leaf growth to ensure that the plant will attain adulthood for prolific production.

Maxifruit is a liquid product which can be applied as a leaf spray before or after the flowering phase and right through the fruit development period and growing phase. It assists the plant to produce an excellent crop of fruit, even under stressful conditions.

Further farming branches in the Southern Cape region are Dohne Merinos and dairy cattle such as Jerseys, Holsteins and Ayrshires. Game farming is expanding rapidly. Timac Agro also plays an important role in animal production with a variety of Calseabloc licks for livestock and game. Each of the licks focus on a specific need and consists of Calsea-mag, Calsea-fibre, Calsea-zinc, Calsea-calver en Calsea-digest.

These products are imported but a mixture providing for specific soil needs, can be mixed.

What do the farmers say?

In conversation with ProAgri farmers were generally very positive about the products.

Cobus du Toit: “My fig harvest increased by 100%!”

Cobus has been manager of Fairfigs, the biggest fig producer in South Africa. This section of the Lourens Group Farms lie between Napier and Caledon on 60 ha planted with French figs of which 50% is exported. A further 30% is marketed locally and the rest, which is not suitable for human consumption, is fed to Dohne Merino sheep.

As the soil on the farm lacks the desired phosphate content, Kobus started using Timac Agro’s D-Coder three years ago. “Within a year after switching to D-Coder I could see a change taking place in the fig trees. The leaves were no longer yellow but a healthy, bright green. This can be ascribed to the fact that the trees were dealing better with stress, resulting in improved photo synthesis. The product yield increased dramatically from 3 ton/ha to 6 ton/ha.

The application of Maxifruit resulted in bigger fruit, simultaneously increasing the 14 days shelf life of the figs by four to five days. Ripe figs are harvested according to the colour and dispatched within 24 hours by airfreight to destinations in Britain, the European Union and Oriental markets. Figs are harvested between December and May with the ideal window for export in April and May before figs from Turkey and Israel come on the market.

Lourens van Eeden: “90% of the nutrients is absorbed”.

Lourens has been farming on the farm Vleitjie for the past 33 years. The farm lies between Swellendam and Heidelberg. Lourens grows barley, wheat, canola, and also keeps a flock of sheep. “Timac Agro distributed pamphlets but they could not explain properly to my liking why their product was better than conventional fertilizers,” says Lourens. Then, one day, Pierre van Vuuren, technical marketer in Heidelberg and a chemical engineer, previously from KwaZulu-Natal, visited him and explained in detail how the D-Coder plant nutrition was developed.

“Die big boss apparently told his scientists he wanted a chemical pellet embedded in a biological matrix and after ten years’ research they came up with the product,” says Lourens. “Ninety per cent of the plant nutrients are taken up by the plant, not only 50% as is the case with other fertilizers.”

As Lourens follows a no-till conservation farming method, he is highly impressed by the product. “Farming is a complex industry and one must approach it holistically. Without running the risk of not using any fertilizer, I am now going to apply these plant growth mediums of which the nutrients are in the correct equation and which the plant can go and fetch when it needs the nutrients.”

Jean van Deventer: “I have just harvested my best barley crop in 22 years.”

Jean has been farming for the past 22 years near Napier with barley, wheat and canola. He started using the Timac Agro products this year.

“I like the idea that the fertilizer is only released when the plant roots go searching for it. It is also convenient that the product can be applied during the planting process because, when it starts raining during planting, it is impossible to get into the lands with any implement.”

Bernard Groenewald, technical marketer at Riviersonderend, did an experiment in the beginning of the year on Jean’s farm. “I could immediately see the advantage as D-Coder does not burn the seed and seedlings as other fertilizers do.”

“I have finished harvesting the barley and the yield is at least 15% higher than before. I have had my best barley harvest ever in 2018 in spite of trying conditions.”

Contact Timac Agro on 071-610-8082 or visit the website www.timacagro.co.za.