Every year, the Agribusiness and Food Center of the Universidad Austral It organizes the Academic Residency in the United States, a core activity of the Master's in Agribusiness. The objective: for students and graduates to come into direct contact with the world's largest agribusiness ecosystem, understand how production, science, technology, financing, and industry are linked throughout the entire value chain, and be able to compare it with the reality faced by agribusiness companies in Latin America.
This year, the route passed through St. Louis, Illinois, Purdue (Indiana) and Chicago.
The program is developed in partnership with two top-tier academic partners: the Center for Food and Agribusiness at Purdue University and the College of Agricultural, Consumer & Environmental Sciences at the University of Illinois.
In Illinois, the group toured the Morrow Plots, the oldest continuous agronomic trial in the United States, which celebrates its 150th anniversary this year, and participated in a discussion on the global commodities landscape. At Purdue, the focus was on the financial performance of U.S. agriculture and digital farming: talks on the Ag Economy Barometer and the adoption of precision agriculture, plus a tour of the Ag Alumni Seed Phenotyping Facility and the Indiana Corn and Soybean Innovation Center.
The first leg of the trip took place at the World Trade Center, with an official welcome and a panel discussion on the region's agribusiness featuring representatives from Bunge, Don Mario (GDM), and Arva. The group also visited Bayer to learn about its biofuel developments and Agragene, which focuses on biotechnology.
In St. Louis, the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center and District 39 North hosted a day dedicated to plant science and entrepreneurship, featuring organizations such as Cultivar Initiative, BioSTL, WashU FARM, Taylor Geospatial Institute, NewLeaf, and the Helix Center. In Illinois, the delegation also visited Research Park, showcasing agtech startups like Digifarmz (Brazil), Frost Defense (Argentina), and HarvestIQ.
Once in Indiana, the group learned about different ways of organizing production and marketing: Keystone Cooperative, a case of agricultural cooperativism, and Becknology™ Days, the event of Beck's Hybrids, a benchmark of the family-based seed industry in the United States.
The delegation visited Fair Oaks Farms to study a large-scale integrated agricultural production model, including dairy, swine and crop production, combined with agritourism and consumer education.
The trip concluded with a focus on the global food industry and futures markets, including meetings at Mondelez International and hEDGEpoint Global Markets, the latter featuring specific research on Argentina. The week ended with an academic and institutional synthesis meeting.
