Take Beet Beyond Borders

CONVISO® SMART stands for a new dimension in sugarbeet cultivation. In an interview with insideKWS, Wolfgang Lüders, Product Manager at the Business Unit Sugarbeet, sets ambitious targets for the system.

Mr. Lüders, could you please briefly explain what CONVISO® SMART is?

CONVISO® SMART is a system comprising sugarbeet seed and herbicide, i.e. a package of two components that complement each other.
Our smart varieties, such as SMART KALLEDONIA KWS, are tolerant to the herbicide CONVISO® ONE from the class of ALS inhibitors. This herbicide would wipe out conventional varieties. The tolerance is the result of traditional breeding, i.e. is not based on genetically modified organisms.

The system has been developed with Bayer. What does that cooperation involve?

Our joint research began in 1998. The goal of KWS and Bayer is to enable efficient weed control in sugarbeet cultivation. There is a clear distribution of tasks: KWS has sole responsibility for breeding the sugarbeet varieties and Bayer for developing the herbicide.

What advantages does that offer KWS?

KWS is responsible for marketing the system. Bayer supplies KWS with the herbicide. That means KWS is the face of CONVISO® SMART in the eyes of farmers. That’s new. We’re leaving familiar territory and for the first time are marketing a system that contains a pesticide in addition to seed. Yet we’re staying true to ourselves by tackling challenges by means of innovative breeding and securing future sugarbeet cultivation area. Marketing seed and herbicide as a combined product has many advantages. One is that KWS is positioning itself as a vendor of an all-round solution and will be able to intensify its already close relationships with farmers. That means we’ll also increase the value added we create.

How far advanced is the CONVISO®SMART project at the moment?

We launched it in six countries in the 2018 sowing season and added twelve more countries in 2019. We surpassed our original sales planning in the past fiscal year.

CONVISO® SMART is now grown on 55,000 hectares worldwide. We’re proud of that enormous success.

What are the next objectives?

The Business Unit Sugarbeet aims to further increase net sales and value added as part of its strategic planning under “Take Beet Beyond Borders.” CONVISO® SMART is the key value driver in that.

What does that mean specifically?

Its market launches are continuing. We’re currently focusing on Austria, Belgium, Morocco, Romania, the United Kingdom and Ireland. We intend to roll out CONVISO® SMART to a total of thirty markets. Our goal is to achieve a market penetration of 15 percent of global sugarbeet cultivation area in the next four years and 40 percent in the next ten.

Those are big plans.

Yes, and we need a lot of assistance to achieve that. CONVISO® SMART is a project at the Business Unit Sugarbeet, but it’s also supported by overarching units at KWS. Our colleagues in the global functions, for example, play a vital part and I’d like to thank them explicitly for their efficient, cross-unit teamwork.

Can you give an outline of that KWS-wide collaboration?

A project like CONVISO® SMART is highly complex. Let’s take Legal, Finance, Logistics, Controlling and IT, for example. They all have to pitch in: Many new contracts with Bayer and our customers have to be drawn up, while distribution of the herbicide needs to be organized. Logistics and Accounting face new tasks, as does IT, which has to map the new processes in the SAP software.

What current challenges are there?

Developing the new markets involves a huge effort. Both components – the seed and herbicide – must each obtain approval in every country. Only then can we sell the system. Registration has still not been completed in the key sugarbeet-growing countries France, Germany and Russia.

We have quite a bit of work to do in New Zealand, Denmark and Japan in the coming years. Every country is different and we originally thought things would be easier. Belarus is exciting, for example. Although the market there is heavily regulated, we achieved a large slice of it in the very first year.

What else is there apart from approval and marketing?

We’re setting up a stewardship system in close coordination with Bayer. That means we’re formulating specifications for using the product and will review compliance with them. Because we want our customers to be able to use CONVISO® SMART sustainably and for a long time to come.

We’re hiring new colleagues for that and developing technologies for specific requirements. One example is drones to detect bolters in sugarbeet fields. We feel sure our efforts will pay off and our successes make us highly motivated to keep on pressing ahead.

What’s especially exciting about the work on CONVISO® SMART for you personally?

I’m inspired by the innovative and highly efficient means of controlling weeds, as a result of which there is less cost and work involved in protecting plants, coupled with better results. The benefits for sugarbeet farmers and KWS are obvious. Just seeing the pleasure with which the teams are working in the markets, their enthusiasm and how they really want to achieve something is also a motivation for me. CONVISO® SMART can only succeed if everyone pulls together in the same direction. I thank all my colleagues and am delighted to be part of this team. |