FRENCH fertiliser company Timac recently played host to a group of Westcountry farmers who wanted to both see and hear, first hand, how a comprehensive range of fertilisers, based around finely ground calcified seaweed, has been able to improve the overall efficiency of a fertiliser programme and also and most importantly, lift profits.

The Roullier Groupe - Timac's parent company - was formed in Brittany about 50 years ago by its still current chairman Daniel Roullier. Huge annual investments in their R & D programme has seen the company develop three core groups of products for the market place, namely Agricultural Supplies, Agrochemicals and Food with the Roullier Groupe employing 5,600 people and actively trading in three different continents and encompassing 35 countries. Group turnover last year was 1.3 billion euros or virtually £1 billion.

A key part of this farmer group's agenda was a close examination of Timac's range of fertilisers and it soon became clear that the sceptics amongst the group - probably the majority - were soon being won over, not by masses of technological information and arguments, but by a simple and sound logic based around naturally occurring raw materials which were backed up with on-going R & D and extremely impressive results. Positive results for grass, cereal and forage crop production which all translated into improved profitability for the dairy, beef and mixed farms.

Timac's first involvement with fertilisers began with calcified seaweed and was first launched into the French market primarily as a soil conditioner and a pH balancer. The raw material - or Maerl as it is often referred - is collected daily by dredgers from a given area off the Brittany coast and then taken back to the port of St Malo where it is ground down to a virtual powder giving 80% solubility, the remaining 20% being made up of 7% magnesium carbonate plus 32 trace elements.

Roullier's trials have confirmed what we have all known for years and that is acidic soils lead to a huge reduction in the efficiency of fertilisers, but conversely, these trials have consistently found that in neutralising the product, a coating of Maerl also optimises the efficiency of that product, which is the key reason why farmers can apply less, get the same or even better yields and therefore save money.

Another real advantage is that by applying a fertiliser which has a neutral pH means that it does not contribute at all to any increasing acidity, in fact pH levels would rise slightly with each application.

Their trials have shown that the average pH in the south west is 6.0, thus highlighting the enormous potential for improvement in fertiliser efficiency - especially those that are nitrogen based.

More and more farmers are becoming increasingly aware of the value of slurry and FYM - the efficiency of which can be maximized with appropriate timing onto soils with pH levels around 6.5.

However, with the average pH being quite a bit lower than this and with slurry being naturally acidifying, the efficiency is severely jeopardized with some of the phosphates being locked up and nitrogen being lost to the atmosphere or just being leached out before the plant has a chance to utilise it.

Roullier's trials have shown that their Maerl based range of fertilisers are extremely compatible with organic manures - and are much more responsive than when compared to the conventionally produced NPK's.

Timac's investments over the years have enabled them to acquire their very own phosphate plant in N Africa - they are the only producer of triple super phosphates in the world - plus a magnesium mine in Spain. They are also the first manufacturer to introduce a nitrogen fertiliser with sulphur and are quick to point out that their nitrogen source never contains nitrates, as they always use sulphate of ammonia and urea. Apparently, this has always been the case - even before the environmental issue of nitrate leaching became an issue.

Their St Malo plant produces over 700,000 tonnes p.a. with annual group sales worldwide of three million tonnes and includes sales of 1.5 million tonnes into the French market where they currently enjoy a 50/60% market share in PK's.

Marketed as Nutribalancer, this specific range of fertilisers is available as PK's or N - all of which contain Maerl and, more recently, a conventional range of NPK's has been introduced as a complimentary role which is available via their blending plant at Teignmouth - courtesy of Mole Valley Forage Services - a joint marketing venture set up last year between Mole Valley Farmers and Timac which offers farmers throughout the South and South West of England huge opportunities to benefit from a combination of marketing talent and worldwide research and development.

Micro-granular products for seed placement are also available for crops such as forage maize, where a typical application is 8-10 kgs per acre and is applied by the contractor at sowing using a specialist applicator.

With Maerl having a high concentration of trace elements, it also features quite strongly in Roullier's extremely successful range of mineral licks where there are individual products for sheep, beef animals, dairy cows, goats, pigs and horses.

The Roullier Groupe have two research stations, one of which is at Pontrieux in Brittany and it is here that they are undertaking a lot of trials on seaweed extract - not just for our own agricultural industry, but most surprising to most if not all of us - the cosmetics industry as well.

There are 25,000 different species of seaweed which are split into three groups - brown, green and red and there is a 12 Ha area, close to St Malo, where seaweed is harvested by either boat or at low tide by hand.

Marketed under the banner of The Leader Range, products can be used as either fertilisers or bio-stimulants and are applied as liquid foliar feeds with a key feature being anti stress. Crops are always experiencing stress, some just after germination when the soil temperatures vary for some reason or other and trials have irrefutable evidence that a foliar feed, applied at the appropriate growth stage, will have enormous benefit to the developing plant.

It is fair to say that Timac's concept of total and more efficient fertilisation methods have not always been fully appreciated within the trade and this has sometimes led to negative comments, mostly involving the muck and mystery theory and also the inevitable comparison of price where costs for NP & K are often interpreted as being expensive but in reality, costs per acre are really competitive due to the product being much more efficient.

Commenting on and summarising the two day visit, N Devon farmer and ex-chairman of Mole Valley Farmers Ranald Fowler (and also, it has to be said, a self confessed sceptic) said that the whole group were extremely grateful for the opportunity to both share and experience the professionalism of Roullier and to learn of the depth of their research.

"We were all pleasantly surprised,'' he said, "at the sheer extent of their involvement and commitment to agriculture and the food industry.'' He went on to say that he felt that everyone in the group - sceptics included - had been certainly won over.