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How to cut cost by process analysis

How to cut cost by process analysis THAT costs will indeed rise is the only certain and unambiguous thing in a volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) world. Margins are vanishing, driven down by cutthroat price competition, downward price pressure from clients, upward price pressure from suppliers doing business. As a result, companies have become more preoccupied with rather than planning the next great product to sell. Traditional cost- cutting , however, may lead to false economies. Cutting the wrong costs ( e. g . , value- adding activities) may lead to much higher overall costs or losses elsewhere. Rightsizing may actually end up as wrongsizing. Here are five false economies to avoid: • Downsizing the frontline staff to cut costs may inadvertently cut sales. According to a sur...

Tips to manage pests

A series of innovative pest management cours es aimed at fruit growers in the region will start next month. Goulburn Ovens Institute of TAFE spokesman Duncan Brown said fruit growers would benefit from attending. The courses, in the Department of Primary Industries training room in Cobram, start next Thursday. ‘‘With this information growers can use a range of strategies to maintain control,’’ Mr Brown said. ‘‘The idea is to maintain a more natural balance in the orchid. ‘‘It’s about not fighting nature, but working with nature. ‘‘It is essential for growers to have a good pest management strategy in place. ‘‘We have put together a range of short courses. ‘‘The idea is that if people are interested in a qualification over two-and-a-half years — doing these short courses actually counts towards a Diploma of Production Horticulture.’’ The TAFE and Fruit Growers Victoria have put their heads together to design this course to help orchardists and staff learn the la...

Warning new ways needed to deal with weeds in crops

If weeds and pests in arable crops are to be controlled successfully in the future a whole range of new strategies will have to be employed, speakers at an agronomy conference held yesterday warned. The problem, an audience at Perth Racecourse heard, is two- fold. The range of active chemical ingredients available was reducing as EU approval regulations become more “This problem has spread much more quickly” stringent and weeds and fungal infections were building up resistance to the old chemistry at a sometimes alarming rate. Conference organiser Hutchinsons has 25 agronomy and supply depots across England and Scotland, including a new one at Forfar, and they have noted real problems especially with weeds. John Cussans, of agronomists Niab TAG, said that resistant black grass has now become an established problem on 16,000 farms right up the eastern side of England. He suspected there might be some as yet undetected resistant blackgrass in Scotland and warned ...

Pest control fogging

THE dengue situation in Singapore has worsened even though fogging is being increasingly carried out, especially in my neighbourhood where it is done almost daily in different houses. The routine use of thermal fogging should be banned. Routine fogging is ineffective, gives people a false sense of security, creates pesticide resistance in mosquitoes, destroys their natural predators and increases the toxic load on the environment. For every 10 adult mosquitoes killed by fogging, there are hundreds of others waiting to hatch if the breeding spots are not attended to. Pest control companies should search for and destroy the breeding areas and treat chronically wet areas with BTI insecticide, which uses bacteria to kill mosquito larvae and does not affect the environment. Controlled thermal fogging should be used only when there is an active cluster of dengue or chikungunya in the area, and with approval from the National Environment Agency. This destroys the v...

Scientists seek flea beetles for research

Farmers are being asked to collect samples of adult cabbage stem flea beetles from oilseed rape crops at harvest. Scientists at Rothamsted Research are on the hunt for samples so they can assess levels of both pesticide resistance and parasitisation by natural enemies in the beetles. In return for sending in a sample, the institute will give farmers data for their own area and a measure of how it compares nationally. Patricia Ortega-Ramos, who is conducting the research, said the call for insects was part of a project to determine if a wasp recently discovered to parasitise the beetles might be an effective bio-control agent. She said cabbage stem flea beetle numbers had been rising since the 2013 ban on neonicotinoid seed treatments in oilseed rape, resulting in serious yield losses in some parts of the country. Farmers are also beginning to see resistance to the only control option currently available – pyrethroid sprays. “But there is new hope for control,” sa...

Urge to rethink farm practices

ACCESSING improved predictors of disease, insect and weed infestations, coupled with a greater use of integrated management, are among the key messages agronomists and growers have been advised to take into the coming season, as a result of this year’s Crop Protection Forum. More than 100 industry delegates convened in South Australia, for the one-day forum, with a view to tackling the brewing storm of fungicide, herbicide and pesticide resistance . “There was a clear call for all involved in growing crops to rethink current paddock practices, which sometimes rely too heavily on chemicals for disease , weed and pest control , in favour of more sustainable farming systems,” Centre for Crop and Disease Management co-director and forum chair Professor Karam Singh said. “The reality is that while the industry’s reliance on these chemicals may provide potential short-term economic gains, it is sacrificing their effectiveness in the long-term. We must now look to metho...

Antibiotics, pesticides at risk

RESISTANCE TO antibiotics and pesticides is rising at alarming rates, shows the first estimates of antibiotic and pesticide "planetary boundaries", published in Nature Sustainability. If resistance to antibiotics and pesticides goes beyond these boundaries, societies risk large-scale health and agricultural crises, say the researchers who have assessed the state of six types of resistance— antibiotic resistance in Gramnegative and Gram-positive bacteria; general resistance to insecticides and herbicides; and resistance to transgenic Btcrops and glyphosate resistance in herbicide resistant cropping systems. Gram-negative bacteria, which includes well-known pathogens such as Salmonella, Klebsiella pneumoniae and E coli, are already beyond the "planetary boundary," as some strains of several species are already resistant to all or most antibiotics tested. Pesticide resistance is also an urgent concern, particularly resistance to glyphosate and insecti...