Engordar is the livestock company of Grupo Lucci that has 29,000 to 30,000 heads in rotation in the provinces of Tucumán, Catamarca and Santiago del Estero. It has 38,000 hectares, 5 livestock establishments and 2 feedlots. Its objective is to provide the domestic market with top quality meats that stand out in their color, flavor, aroma, tenderness and nutritional value. For this, it carries out exhaustive controls on its animals that measure the efficiency of its production system and that guarantee good results. In addition, Engordar cattle comply with a complete health plan and have professional management throughout the process.
The company integrates the activities of breeding, pastoral rearing, feedlot and cabin. This integration allows the needs of their establishments to meet each other. In turn, for each establishment to take advantage of its productive resources, the company buys heads in wintering markets and implements a strategy that ensures the acquisition of those heads at different times of the year.
“One field compensates for the needs of the other, having integrated the five establishments into the company’s productive design”
Eng. Daniel Navarro
Engordar Manager
In 2018, Engordar had a commercial growth by selling 30.4% more in heads and 37.10% in kilos compared to the previous year. A similar increase is expected for 2019 while marketing is consolidated at the same rate of production in the fields. “It is important that the commercial area exert pressure on the productive area and vice versa,” explains the manager, highlighting the alignment achieved by the work team that allowed closing new and more businesses.
Own-produced bulls in their cabins
For 10 years, Engordar has had cabins that have the objective of originating bulls for different rodeos. The company owns three cabins with Braford, Black Brangus and, as of this year, Brangus Colorado races with which it covers 55% of its need. Each cabin has about 200 mothers per race, defining a potential of 85 males per race, of which about 30% per year are selected.
“Our livestock must cover a demand of 120 bulls per year. This situation posed the challenge of setting up their own cabins”
Eng. Daniel Navarro
Engordar Manager
The selection by biotype of the mother cow as well as the allocation of the father bull is important in the process that originates own bulls.
“These cabins do not have a commercial purpose or a sales purpose, at least for now, since we have a great demand for our own bulls. If we continue on this path of continuous improvement we can think about the possibility of marketing bulls in the future”, says Daniel Navarro.
Intensive Bovine Breeding: a controlled breeding system
The progressive growth of the livestock activity of Engordar demands more wintering. The company advances in the implementation of another calf production system: Intensive Bovine Breeding. Through which, calves with their own genetics are obtained, more controlled, more stable and more predictable in their productive performance. This system also allows to save the costs of transfers of livestock, having intensive breeding within the same livestock establishment. At the same time, travel stress, change of environment and water change that occurs in animals are avoided. The management of these factors, in short, makes it possible to improve the productive result and competitiveness.
The Intensive Bovine Breeding system requires adequate infrastructure that encourages particular care for animals. This implies the installation of half leftovers that help to counteract the heat and the construction of hills within the pens that allow the cow to move away from the mud in times of rain.
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For Intensive Bovine Breeding it is important to develop a strategy within the controlled environment that avoids the births of calves in rainy seasons. The fact that the cow has its birth in the mud and in the humidity creates the possibility of the animal contracting diseases or infections.
Engordar is in the process of implementing Intensive Bovine Breeding in its production process, since it keeps livestock in a controlled environment. Under this system the cows breed calves in confinement that are released to the field after weaning, in approximately 15 months. The first stage of the Intensive Bovine Breeding begins with the nine months of gestation of the cow, the second stage includes the four months of lactation and the third stage involves two more months of confinement until the calf reaches a weight of 220 kilos.