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- AgCenter announces new agronomist for soybeans and sugarcane
Andre Reis was born and raised in the big city of Sao Paulo, Brazil, but at 16, he decided he wanted to go to the countryside and study agriculture. His career path has taken him to many places, the latest being the LSU AgCenter Dean Lee Research Station near Alexandria.
Reis’ role with the AgCenter will include working with sugarcane and soybeans in central Louisiana, two crops that make up significant acreage in his native Brazil. Most of his research work will be conducted at Dean Lee and the LSU AgCenter Iberia Research Station.
When Reis moved from Sao Paulo, he landed in Piracicaba, which is the birthplace of the Brazilian sugarcane industry. In 2002, he began his undergraduate studies and received his bachelor’s degree in agronomy in 2007. He received his master’s in 2013 and a doctorate in 2017 in crop science.
During his academic career, he spent one year in Michigan and was involved with seed corn production. He also spent time working in the Brazilian Cerrado, one of the most biodiverse savannas in the world.
“I spent seven years working as a consultant in the north area of Brazil,” Reis said. “We were converting pastureland to row crops for the first time. There were many fertility issues involved.”
Reis said the land use conversion did not have a manual, so much of the work involved trial and error.
“We were doing it from scratch,” he said. “I was involved in a lot of on-farm trials, and much of my research focused on soybeans and low-land rice.”
He enjoys research because he believes it has a real-world application and can bring changes that benefit farm production.
Reis spent time as an agronomist for John Deere, working for their Latin America Innovation Center. His primary duties involved exploring innovative techniques for improving sugarcane and soybean production systems that would lead to higher yields.
Prior to accepting the AgCenter assignment, Reis had a research assignment at Kansas State University focusing on nutrient management in wheat, soybean and corn crops.
Reis’ appointment will be 75% research and 25% extension work.