Kory Melby (38) was born
and raised in a small farming community in northwest Minnesota. Kory
graduated from Greenbush High School and continued his education at
the University of Minnesota, Crookston campus. He majored in Farm
Management and Ag Aviation. Kory has been actively involved with
production agriculture for 20 years. Kory's first visit to Brazil
was in 1994 with a group of producers from Minnesota and North
Dakota. Kory became fascinated in Brazil again in the late 1990s
when the American Ag media highlighted the aggressive soybean
expansion in Mato Grosso.
In January 2001 Kory
joined a group of progressive producers and businessmen on a tour of
Mato Grosso. Once Kory grasped the magnitude of the global
competition facing him, he decided to make some structural changes
in his family's farming operation. In the following years Kory
returned to Brazil eight times to research opportunities in the
agricultural sector. Kory now lives with his wife and son in the
city of Goiânia, Goiás Brazil.
The past four years
have been spent researching land and business opportunities within
Brazil. Kory has traveled throughout the country gaining knowledge
and experience in numerous different venues. The most important
aspect for doing business within Brazil is the social connection.
Kory has spent countless hours developing relationships inside of
Brazil.
The state of Mato
Grosso is my area of expertise. However with contacts in Bahia,
Tocantins, Sao Paulo and Paraná, I feel very comfortable discussing
the conditions in each of the aforementioned states. Kory does
consulting for various hedge funds and private equity groups. Kory
has also organized and hosted numerous tours through Brazil and
Argentina. The tours have ranged from VIP infrastructure tours to
curious producers from USA and Canada. Kory has also assisted
journalists from Minneapolis Star Tribune, Wisconsin State Journal,
Forth Worth Star Telegram and Virginia Quarterly. Kory also provides
soybean industry analysis for the Red River Farm Network and
Financial Times London.
Kory's comment:
“I know I have done
my job when I say goodbye to a group at the airport and they have
tears in their eyes telling me they don't want to go home.”
