CGFAR students participate in the International Food and Agribusiness Management Association Conference

Blog post by Claire Adams

Towards the end of June four students represented the Centre for Global Food and Resources (CGFAR) at the 2019 International Food and Agribusiness Management Association (IFAMA) conference held in Hangzhou, China. The theme of this year’s conference was “Food Security 2050: e-Commerce, Agri-food Value Chain Transformation” and was preceded by an Academic Symposium and Case Study Competition held at Zhejiang University. Accompanied by staff member Theo Simos the four students Ben Pitt, Chris Moloney, Claire Adams and Daniel Le Feuvre participated in the case study competition as well as attending the main conference. The four students are all completing either Master of Agribusiness or Master of Global Food and Agricultural Business and used their learning from these degrees, as well as other work experience to prepare a 15-minute presentation to judges on a paper given at the start of a four-hour window.

The case study given to the groups this year was titled “Bioceres S.A: Ag Biotechnology Expansion from an Emerging Country” and explored the investment decision of a South American farmer relating to a biotechnology company hoping to launch as a publicly listed company with a product promising to deliver drought tolerance in soy beans. Over the four hours give to prepare the presentation to three judges the team approached it as a high risk, high reward scenario with evidence for this reasoning. Unfortunately, the team did not progress to the final round, however promising feedback was received from the judges that will hopefully be able to be applied to future teams entering the case study competition.

Over the course of the conference a number of thought-provoking presentations were given by a variety of academics and professionals representing a number of global countries and institutions. In particular a presentation given on the history, growth and future of Ali Baba, a company founded in Hangzhou was particularly insightful and engaging.  A number of topics and ideas were addressed including rural economies, sustainability, ecommerce, land rights and technology.

Over the course of the week that the participants were in Hangzhou they were able to do some exploring of the local area, including attending a spectacular light show on the historic West Lake and browsing through the local night markets. The students wish to extend their thanks to all those who helped them prepare for the competition in the weeks leading up to the competition, as well as the CGFAR for the support in attending the conference. The 2020 IFAMA conference will be the 30^th annual conference and will be held in Rotterdam in the Netherlands with preparations already progressing well.