Agriculture

Agricultural Team

From the beginning, vegetable agronomy and the transfer of knowledge to contract growers has played a major role in McCain's worldwide success.

Today our global team of approximately 140 McCain agriculturalists and 60 agronomists – representing one of the largest potato teams in the world, with expertise in pest management, plant pathology, storage, seed potatoes, irrigation, farm mechanization, soil science and crop physiology – is focused on supplying high-quality, safe and sustainable raw product, such as potatoes, peas, beans, carrots and many other vegetables, to our manufacturing facilities worldwide. With more than 1,600 research projects completed and dozens more currently being conducted, our team is focused on continual improvement of our potatoes and other vegetables.

The Potato Calculator:

A Decision Support System developed by Crop & Food Research, a New Zealand-based, government research organization, the Potato Calculator™ is a web-based potato growth model and crop  management tool that reports daily on canopy growth, yield, soil nitrogen, evaporation, the amount of nitrogen in the soil profile and the amount of water drained and nitrogen leached below the root zone. Simulating the interaction of these components with prior seasonal climatic and crop management decisions allows growers to optimize the use of nitrogen fertilizer and water inputs so that growing costs and environmental impacts are minimized. This decision support tool is being used by a growing number of McCain growers across New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the U.S.