Horsch’s central representative office recently opened in Ukraine. The complex combines both training space for specialists and a spare-parts warehouse, a workshop, an exhibition ground, and much more. Similar centres exist in only a few countries, so with this, Horsch has shown that the Ukrainian market is one of its priorities.
What’s more, the manufacturer bought a plot of land with room to spare in advance, since it intends to build production facilities in Ukraine.
During the centre’s grand opening, we spoke with ABA “Astra” General Director Ihor Hubariev. The dealer company has worked with Horsch for many years, so we asked about the prospects for the new centre in Ukraine and about ABA “Astra”‘s plans for the future.
Horsch’s representative office in Kyiv region
Traktorist.ua: How important is the opening of the Horsch centre for ABA “Astra”? What opportunities will this site give the company?
Ihor Hubariev: Our company is the first Horsch machinery dealer in Ukraine, where, starting in 2007, ABA “Astra” has actively represented this brand. For us, the opening of a new, modern Horsch centre in Ukraine is a landmark event and evidence of an important step by the manufacturer to hold on to its leading position in the Ukrainian market. After all, it’s Ukrainian farmers who’ve made a significant contribution to shaping the ideas behind new types of Horsch machinery and their adaptation to local conditions. Every new unit undergoes thorough testing in Ukraine’s fields. Today, Ukraine ranks among the top three by Horsch sales volumes worldwide. So it was a logical decision to open a new, powerful centre near Kyiv, which includes an expanded spare-parts warehouse, a zone for organizing machinery demonstrations, an exhibition ground with a wide range of machinery, and equipped classrooms for training. In addition, the site allows for localizing and organizing Horsch machinery production at this location in the near future. This way, Horsch becomes even more accessible, more comfortable and closer to the Ukrainian farmer, and that’s the core of the company’s strategy! For ABA “Astra,” the new centre will provide new opportunities for actively growing a community of farmers who embrace the brand’s values and are focused on growth.
Ihor Hubariev, General Director of ABA “Astra”
Horsch’s standout advantage is its innovation, openness, speed of response, accountability, and exceptional focus on customer needs, — Ihor Hubariev noted.
Traktorist.ua: How popular is Horsch machinery in the regions where ABA “Astra” operates? What are the sales results?
Ihor Hubariev: Horsch machinery holds a leading position on the Ukrainian market among seeding and tillage equipment. The most popular best-selling models: the Maestro row-crop seeders, the Pronto seeding complexes, the Tiger cultivators, the Joker disc harrows, and so on. New Horsch machinery types drawing particular interest from customers are the self-propelled and trailed sprayers, fitted with a number of innovative and unique solutions designed to fundamentally change the approach to applying plant-protection products and set a new standard for this type of machine.
Traktorist.ua: What plans does your company have for promoting the Horsch brand in Ukraine?
Ihor Hubariev: Today, Ukrainian farmers approach the question of choosing machinery very carefully. It has to fit the chosen growing and tillage technology, perform the necessary technological operations within set time windows, according to clearly defined parameters, accounting for the specific farm’s natural and climatic conditions. The most effective way to convey the value of a machine to a customer is to demonstrate it at work and test it in the farm’s own fields, often side by side with other units. From ABA “Astra”‘s experience, in the vast majority of cases, Horsch machinery fully meets the stated requirements and even exceeds expectations. So the effectiveness of these demonstrations is very high. It’s also very important to make sure the staff at a farm that’s bought the machinery have fully mastered the skills to operate it and know how to use it most effectively. Next comes timely, qualified service support. For us, the best way to promote it is a satisfied customer who, having bought the machinery, got more than they expected and can give an honest recommendation to other farmers.
Traktorist.ua: What interesting financial instruments does the company offer for purchasing Horsch machinery for farmers?
Ihor Hubariev: ABA “Astra” offers a range of attractive financing terms for purchasing agricultural machinery. That includes credit/leasing at preferential interest rates with a reduced down payment, and short-term payment deferral terms for machinery. We try to stay flexible and understand farmers’ needs.
Traktorist.ua: How liquid is Horsch machinery on the used-equipment market? Does ABA “Astra” sell used Horsch machinery?
Ihor Hubariev: Horsch machinery is very popular on the market, so there’s a lot of demand for used equipment too. However, it’s not easy for us yet to find customers who’d be ready to trade in their used Horsch machinery for new. The machinery holds up over a long period given timely maintenance. That said, we’re always ready to swap a customer’s used machinery for an updated modification through the trade-in programme.
Traktorist.ua: What plans does ABA “Astra” have for the coming year, and also looking ahead 3-5 years?
Ihor Hubariev: ABA “Astra”‘s plans include opening a service centre in Vinnytsia by the end of 2021, and launching a project that’s important to us: transforming the company’s service function. Over the next few years, we plan to actively grow the number of regional representative offices in Ukraine, develop the precision farming line of business, test and adopt innovative products and technologies, and deepen our digitalization expertise. The world is changing fast and opens up incredible new opportunities every day for boosting efficiency, including in agriculture. ABA “Astra”‘s core strategy is a customer-first focus, building long-term partnerships, and creating value for customers from our cooperation.
Traktorist.ua: What new lines of business or machinery brands does the company plan to develop?
Ihor Hubariev: The company focuses on developing agricultural machinery brands that we’ve already successfully represented in Ukraine for many years: Fendt, Valtra, Horsch, Manitou, Bogballe, Valley. These are world market leaders and among the most professional and innovative manufacturers, developing rapidly and creating advanced solutions and technologies. As for new promising areas to develop — that’s precision farming, which is spreading rapidly among Ukrainian farmers and covers many diverse sub-areas linked by shared technologies in digitalization, artificial intelligence, robotics, remote control, and so on. We already offer customers some elements alongside our machinery — navigation, telemetry, precision-seeding management, fertilizer and plant-protection distribution management, irrigation-control automation, and so on. In the near term, our plans include drone-spraying services and comprehensive adoption of precision farming systems on farms.
Fendt-brand tractors paired with Horsch machinery
Traktorist.ua: What can you be proud of in the company’s work, based on the first half of 2021?
Ihor Hubariev: In the first half of 2021, despite significant production complications and supply-chain disruptions that occurred everywhere in the world, we managed to organize our operations in a way that meant our customers felt as little of these negative effects as possible. I consider that our main achievement! As for sales volumes, based on our expectations, 2021 will be the most successful year for agricultural machinery dealers in Ukraine’s history to date. Record prices for agricultural produce and optimistic harvest-volume forecasts give hope that demand for agricultural machinery will stay strong through the second half of 2021 as well.
Traktorist.ua: What trends do you see in recent years in farmers’ choice of seeding and tillage machinery? What’s being bought more, what less? What’s ahead of us in the coming years?
Ihor Hubariev: Lately we’ve observed three key trends:
- Versatility. Our customers first and foremost pay attention to how widely a machine can be used. When buying machinery, a modern farmer needs confidence that, regardless of the conditions in the field, their machinery will be flexible enough and can easily be adapted for every operation they’ve planned;
- Precision. There’s no getting around this in modern farming. Horsch has an entire range of seeding machines that can satisfy even the most demanding customer. What’s more, these machines get new options and technical solutions added every year, which to some extent make them unique on the market;
- Speed. Recent years show that there’s critically little time left to complete operations on schedule, so a modern farmer needs high-output machines, which is exactly what the Horsch brand is known for. As an example, we can point to the Maestro seeders with their updated metering units, the trailed and self-propelled Leeb sprayers, the Cultro crushers, and others.
Horsch Leeb 6.280 VL sprayer
Traktorist.ua: What are ABA “Astra”‘s future plans for cooperation with Horsch in the near term?
Ihor Hubariev: Horsch’s goal is to build a complete system of combinable machines and mechanisms for every farming operation: soil preparation, sowing, spraying, crop care, fertilizer application, logistics, and so on. Everything except harvesting. Our plans for cooperation with Horsch are ambitious. The manufacturer is very actively modernizing its machinery line-up, so there are always new products that need to be actively promoted and rolled out.
Traktorist.ua: Thank you for the interesting conversation.
Andrii Hubin, 2021, Traktorist.ua (opens in a new tab)
