Built for people and seed

Our Seed Inventory in Einbeck is a treasure trove of breeding material spanning several decades. Our colleagues responsible for storing, processing and providing seed there also benefit from the new building.

As big as a soccer pitch with a tartan track – that’s how Jonas Wielert, the head of the Seed Inventory, describes its size. He adds a precise figure: It covers an area of 8,300 square meters, with just under a fifth of that taken up by the small parts warehouse – 54 rows of shelves on each of the four levels, offering space for 1.3 million lots of sugarbeet, oilseed rape and catch crop seed.

And the Seed Inventory is not just used as a warehouse, but is also a production complex: “When seed arrives from Italy, France, Spain, Chile or Germany, we decide whether it should be processed in production or is destined directly for storage,” says Jonas. The reverse is true when a request for stored seed for new tests is received from breeding. “We then ensure that it is given the desired seed treatments and is sent to the breeding stations.” Systems for these coloring and plant protection processes are located on the top floor of the two-story building.

The previous Seed Inventory dating from 1950 had reached its limits for these three core tasks of storing, processing and providing seed. It only offered half as much space as the new building, and good climatic conditions were only guaranteed for half of the seed. It also no longer met KWS’ requirements in terms of sustainability and working conditions for employees.

Sustainable lighthouse project

After seven years of planning and two years of construction, the result is an Seed Inventory that is “a lighthouse project for sustainable industrial buildings in the Einbeck region,” says Jonas. “We generate so much solar power that we can even use it to supply the main campus on sunny days.” Another innovative feature: Waste heat from Einbeck’s sewage treatment plant is fed into the Seed Inventory to cover the building’s entire heating requirements. The old storehouse was heated using the local heating network, which is mainly powered by natural gas.

The new building also boasts significant improvements for colleagues. Demands for a modern workplace played a crucial part in the planning. Concrete examples: Previously, individual work steps were spread over several stories, but are now mainly on one level, the ground floor. An elevator with five times more space is available for transporting the seed to the second floor for processing. Another energy-saving feature is a swivel lift that eliminates the strain involved in pouring seed from containers into the sieving machines.

Employees also notice that the building has been adapted to the needs of their colleagues on the second floor, where the social and recreational section is located. More than 130 lockers are available for the approximately 50 permanent employees and 80 seasonal workers, compared with only 55 before. Work and private clothing can be stored separately in them. The rest room offers space for 65 people (previously 28), plus 25 on a balcony. “Because it would have taken 15 minutes longer to walk to the canteen from the new location, breakfast is brought to the Seed Inventory by delivery service after being ordered using a special app,” says Jonas. “If you want a hot meal, there is a food vending machine with a steam cooker so that the night shift can also warm up healthy meals.”

The more pleasant working conditions result in better performance, as was recently demonstrated by that fact that processing of very small quantities of oilseed rape by hand has likewise been relocated to the Seed Inventory – and under the new conditions, the work was completed almost two weeks earlier than in the previous year. In addition to the 50 existing machines, a further 120 new ones have been purchased for carrying out mechanical work steps.

This benefits our breeders, i.e. the clientèle for the Seed Inventory. “You can rest assured that, despite an increasingly diverse portfolio, we are equipped to handle all orders and meet the deadlines.” In particular in the case of oilseed rape, there are sometimes only a few days available for processing between harvesting and sowing the new seed. “We now have much better conditions for that.”

And Jonas is fired up to get even more out of the storehouse. “We have an ingenious building with far more space to increase capacity and possibly add further crops. And I’m looking forward to analyzing all the processes now, exploiting synergies and optimizing work steps – so that we can enhance our performance and so recoup our spending on what is the biggest ever investment project at the Einbeck location.” |