I spent ten days in Brazil and did not stay in one place more than two days. Although it showcases some of the best beaches in the world, my time was mostly spent traveling through oceans of soybean and cotton fields. Brazil is a wild place full of wild animals and wild opportunities. Its people are as warm and colorful as the climate and the natural wonders. The catch is, along with the natural beauty comes natural dangers and risks. The coastal cities are huge while the rural areas are typically sparcely populated. That trend has started to change with the agricultural boom of the last 10 years. Rural cities have been growing but that is changing as quickly as it started. In the last two years growers have been hit hard.

The general sentiment amongst growers and ag professionals is that only the good managers or ones that had substantial capital to begin with would survive through this challenging time. From my time at the Field Day sponsored by Fundacao MT, everyone involved in agricultural are organizing and working together to come out of this crisis stronger. Optimism and encouragement permeated the gathering's discussions.

Although I do not speak Portuguese, I was able to communicate quite well with the growers, because many of them had grown up in southern Brazil and sold part of their farms to expand up into north central Brazil. We were able to speak "portunol" which is a combination of Spanish and Portuguese, spoken in southern Brazil and northeastern Uruguay. Growers shared that they could sell one hectare in southern Brazil and buy 300 hectare in the Mato Grosso region. What a deal! Although there are several hidden costs to pay for that kind of deal. First, you have to clear the native landscape and raise limited crops the first two years. Second, you have to build the soil quality up for production of higher end crops, then you have to pay extra for inputs and transportation due to long distances from the ports. I was absolutely astounded at the size of the fields in Brazil.

It was common to see a 10,000 hectare field ... 25,000 acres. If you would like to travel to Brazil to see this for yourself I would encourage you to, but be prepared to travel very long distances on two lane roads with occasional potholes and potential livestock. While traveling to visit Lance Tyler's farm, a country dirt road that was in fairly decent shape turned into a raging river after 2 hours of rainfall while we were visiting his farm! A trip to Brazil is definitely for the adventurous spirit!