When you think of agricultural science graduates working on farms abroad, dairy and New Zealand or grain and the USA spring to mind. The tropics and growing bananas and pineapples doesn’t seem like a natural fit for an agricultural science graduate from Ireland.

But that is exactly what Declan O’Neill decided to do when he was offered a position on the Fyffes graduate management programme two years ago.

Declan, who comes from a dairy farm in Co Tipperary, couldn’t be further from home when I meet him on a pineapple farm in Costa Rica. The now sun-kissed 27-year-old has spent the last two years working with Fyffes on their massive operations in Central America.

Diverse CV

With a CV that reads more like a brochure from a travel agent, he has spent the last two years in Belize, Costa Rica, Panama, and Honduras, learning how to grow bananas and pineapples – and all in Spanish.

He is more than happy to bring me around the 2,000 ha farm, stopping occasionally to speak to some of the 780 people employed on the farm, most of whom are mainly from Costa Rica or neighbouring Nicaragua. He is one of only a handful of English speakers on the farm.

Declan, who is now fluent in Spanish, said that one of the hardest parts of moving out here was the language, but after only nine months he had mastered it by just jumping in and not being afraid to just start speaking it. Fyffes has a good language support programme in place where you can either live with a local family for a period of time or link in with a Spanish teacher to get a solid foundation quickly.

Costa Rica is a small country in Central America, with a population of around five million. He lives on the farm which is three hours south of the main city and capital – San Jose.

This is a fairly isolated place, where restaurants and bars are thin on the ground. He is connected to the world and his friends through Facebook and Twitter. Declan says he has adjusted well to the different pace of life here, the weather is good, being nearly a constant 20oC to 30oC all year round and not too dry.

He misses certain aspects of life in Ireland, such as his friends and family, the gym and the food, but he enjoys the challenge of living in this area. The opportunity has given him the chance to explore the wider area of South and Central America on holidays and long weekends.

Fyffes is the largest banana brand in Europe and it is also the largest melon exporter to the USA. Part of its secret of success has been its meticulous focus on controlling its supply chain and on quality.

Fyffes owns and farms more than 10,000 ha across Central America. This is a massive operation with huge scale. The farm has over 70 tractors, 40 meter sprayers and almost 800 employees, as a lot of the work involves manual labour – from the planting to the picking. On this particular farm, they plant pineapples every day and every week 25 acres must be planted by hand to meet demand. Declan explains that it takes a pineapple 13 months to grow and it likes a warm climate with plenty of water.

He tells me that pineapples are technically not a fruit but rather a tropical plant with edible multiple fruits consisting of coalesced berries. It is an inflorescence which is a collection of small flowers. Each flower dies off and this turns into the scales that are typical of a pineapple. It ripens from the base up and the pickers decide whether the pineapple is ready. Once picked, it does not ripen any more.

The farm employs a team of agronomists, who are all agricultural science graduates from Costa Rica, to advise on the growing. Fyffes is the oldest fruit brand in the world and its headquarter is in Dublin and it is listed on the Dublin stock exchange.

The fields are laid out in blocks that are 17m wide to accommodate the spray boom. Drains are dug to ensure water flows away from the pineapple quickly. The block is not driven on, and tracks are laid out in each field.

Each plant yields two harvests over two years. Once harvested, the pineapples are bought to the packing house at the centre of the farm. Quality is critical and this is one of the key challenges for the farm. Declan needs to understand the post-harvest diseases and their prevention.

Despite the pineapples leaving the farm the day after they are picked, it takes up to 22 days to cross the Atlantic. That means that the pineapples will be almost one month old by the time they are sold from the supermarket shelf.

Declan says he has been working closely with the agronomy, environmental and quality teams and has learned the challenges which arise on large-scale banana and pineapple farms. He says this is giving him real insight into the operations of a large-scale business. He is able to apply the technical concepts he learned in Ireland and adapt them to suit the different crops.

Having been involved in irrigation, land preparation, seed selection, planting and fertiliser, he says soil management is one of the most critical aspects of running this farm.

One of his more interesting projects has been working on a full cost control report across the farm and looking at areas to create efficiencies and reduce costs. He says that, like any farm, this is about yield and productivity. He says it doesn’t really matter what the crop is because after a full crop cycle you get to know how that plant grows and its disease and weed problems.

His knowledge of this fascinating crop is impressive, especially considering he comes from a dairy farm in Tipperary. He is getting a real insight into all aspects of the business and has spent his time developing himself along with his career in the agricultural industry.

Fyffes has been running this programme for a number of years and is interested in getting people like Declan who can push boundaries, think outside the box, are not afraid of a challenge and can work as part of a team to solve problems and reach targets.

Declan graduated in 2012 with a Bachelors degree in Agricultural Science (animal and crop production) from University College Dublin. He then went on to complete a Master’s degree in arable crop management in the University in Essex in the UK. He has also worked on dairy farms in New Zealand and for a straw business in Lincolnshire in the UK.

For further information on entering this programme, contcact Greg O’Hanlon or Sharon Kinsella on greg@consultghi.com (086-328 5949) or sharon@consultghi.com (086-2359647). CL