Students embrace culture of Brazil
by Kaity Kerwin, posted May 2, 2008
photos courtesy of Leon Schumacher
Spring Break in Brazil may conjure up images of the beaches of Rio, but for 24 CAFNR students, a trip to Brazil brought an intense introduction to South American agriculture.
Accompanied by Leon Schumacher, professor of agricultural systems management, and Sandy Zaring, administrative assistant, the students left on March 23 for a 10-day adventure to Sao Paulo, Brazil, and the surrounding area.
The trip focused not only on production of cattle and crops, but also on the culture of the fifth-largest country in the world. The students met every week during the first part of the spring semester, and were able to earn three hours of humanities credit.
Above, the group poses before leaving on a rafting adventure, left.
The group arrived in Sao Paulo on Monday, March 24, to receive a welcome by faculty of ESALQ (Escola Superior de Agricultura Luiz de Queiroz, a well-known agricultural science institution). They also checked into their hotel and had their first taste of Brazilian food.
On Tuesday, they visited Cambuhy, a large farm that produces oranges, coffee, rubber and more. After lunch they departed to Marchesan, a farm machinery manufacturer.
Emily Brunk, a plant science major, and one of the few freshman to go on the trip, thought visiting Cambuhy was probably the most interesting part of the trip.
“Seeing such a huge farm and their processes for crops I had never seen before was very neat,” Brunk said.
The next day, the students visited CAROL (Cooperativa dos Agricultores da Regiao de Orlandia, a large farmer coop in Orlandia), where the group toured a soybean processing plant. That afternoon, the students left for Agromen, a horse farm and private tractor/car museum.
Thursday the students visited Fazenda Canchin, or EMBRAPA (the Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária) National Cattle Research Center. They then stopped in Sao Pedro for lunch and traveled on to Fazenda Campestre, a large dairy farm with chicken facilities.
The trip included a tour of the largest flower auction center in Brazil, and a plantation where they learned how to collect the latex sap used to make rubber.
On Friday, the group departed for Holambra, where they visited Veiling, which is the largest flower auction center in Brazil, and a flower exporter. That afternoon they went to Campinas’ Agronomic Institute to tour their facilities.
Saturday was the group’s “Fun Day.” In Brotas, the group enjoyed rafting, trails, tubing, and tree climbing. They spent the evening in Sao Paulo’s shopping center.
The fun continued on Sunday with a trip to Sao Paulo’s zoo and then Republica’s Square, known as the “Hippie Market,” which was actually a souvenir shop. Later that day they went to Sao Paulo’s Museum of Modern Arts.
The Agromen tractor museum.
On Monday the group visited a Sugar Mill and then a sugar-cane field. This was followed by a trip to CNH, a coffee and sugar-cane harvester and agricultural machinery manufacturer. They then went on to Morro Grande, a local coffee roaster.
Jarred Jennings, senior agricultural systems management and mechanical engineering major, really enjoyed the tour of the coffee roaster.
“The tour was in-depth, the people were really nice, and they gave us free coffee,” Jennings said. “They actually roasted some coffee and showed us the process in their test lab.”
Tuesday, April 1, was the last day of their stay in Brazil. In the morning they toured Caterpillar’s facilities, had a farewell lunch and returned to their hotel to pack. They left late that night and arrived back on campus on Wednesday afternoon.
Professor Schumacher felt the students had a great experience in Brazil because it is a country rich in culture.
“The sugar mill was most interesting for me,” Schumacher said. “I had not seen that before.”
He really enjoyed the group of students he took with him.
“This group was a really fun group to travel with; they were a very ‘on-time’ group,” he said. “I think the students, by and large, were really impressed.
Schumacher also said that the food was often the highlight of the trip. The food was good, and there was always a great deal of meat, along with rice, potato salad, and beans. He felt the food was fairly similar to that of the United States. Plus, because meat was such an important part of the meal, customers paid for their food by the pound.
Other cultural differences Schumacher noted included clothing, the way people greet each other, and that they like to eat later in the day. However, he did say that Brazil is similar to the United States in many ways and the people are very friendly.
Schumacher is currently looking into either China or Italy for next fall. If you are interested in participating in the next ASM study abroad trip, contact Professor Schumacher at schumacherl@missouri.edu.
