The exodus of sharecroppers, the scarcity and cost of labor, the need for mechanization and rationalization of cultivation practices, the demand for increasingly conspicuous and timely services, the complementarity of interventions, the expansion of economic commitments, the need for the full use of resources led the Fattoria Autonoma Tabacchi to devise the UdS (Service Unit) project that considers tobacco cultivation no longer as an end but as a tool for entrepreneurial promotion and, therefore, social and economic at the same time. Making the most of the experience accumulated over years of activity, its organization, its capabilities and its resources, the Fattoria has always intended to renew the ways of managing the agricultural enterprise to make it compatible with the economic reality, as it is today. The UdS project started from the elementary consideration that the machine has ceased to be a simple tool to become the subject of production, that services in the modern agricultural economy have a role of absolute pre-eminence and that interest is a much more productive coagulating element than law and political conviction. The path taken by F.A.T. from 1911 to today is enormous; the activity of the Farm has increased both in size and quality. Through the associated companies, F.A.T. has extended its intervention, originally limited to tobacco, to all crops (wheat, corn, sunflower, barley, oats, beetroot), has taken charge of land reorganization and hydraulic arrangement of the land and has taken on the burden of managing the agricultural companies. FAT accompanies and assists its members in every phase, both with regard to the agronomic and bureaucratic aspects, providing the following services:

• INSURANCE POLICIES
• AGRICULTURAL SERVICE CENTER
• OUTSOURCING
• TOBACCO CURE
• WAREHOUSE MANAGEMENT
• WORKFORCE ORGANIZATION
• SEEDLING PRODUCTION

The company, Insurance Agency, began its activity in 2008 as an agency of FATA Assicurazione with the aim of providing technical and commercial assistance to the members of the FAT group. F.A.T.A, "Fondo Assicurativo Tra Agricoltori" initially dedicated its commitment to the safety and prevention of the agricultural world. In 2013 FATA became part of the Cattolica world and in 2016 it was definitively incorporated becoming CATTOLICA in all respects. Our agency offers a wide range of insurance solutions for every type of need. Insurance products for the person, for circulation, for commerce, for industry and for the agricultural world such as: All Risks insurance, Theft/fire, RCT/O, Accidents, Electronics, RC Auto, health insurance. It also offers home insurance, theft/fire insurance, travel insurance and pension insurance and policies for supplementary pension provision. The proposals are developed based on the needs of each customer, always proposing the most suitable policy for each of their needs. Our collaborators are available for any type of consultancy both within our offices and at home depending on your needs.

In 2002, the Fattoria Autonoma Tabacchi Soc. Coop. a r.l. group established the technical assistance service for agricultural companies, starting to collaborate with C.A.N.A.P.A. - , with the aim of optimizing and personalizing the useful services for its members, and with ANPA - Associazione Nazionale Produttori Agricoli, a professional agricultural organization that already owns C.A.N.A.P.A., created on the initiative of groups of farmers who decide to defend their common professional, economic, social and moral interests in a position of autonomy and dignity.
ANPA began its activities with the Constituent Assembly held in Rome on 18/2/2000 and already in the first year of activity it became accredited with AGEA with which it signed the General Convention in 2001. It is now present in all regions and in almost all Italian provinces.
In 2008, MIPAAF began to call ANPA to the Supply Chain Tables established at the Ministry.
In 2009 ANPA joined the General Association of Italian Cooperatives and entered the capital of CAAGCI S.r.l. which today in June 2013 became CAA LiberiAgricoltori S.R.L.

The priority objectives of CAA LiberiAgricoltori s.r.l. are:

• Provide economic consultancy to agricultural companies, dissemination and updating on community regulations and national and regional directives.
• Assistance to agricultural operators in processing requests for benefits at community, national and regional levels.
• Control of the formal regularity of the applications with constant updating of the manufacturer's file.
• Carrying out service activities on the basis of specific agreements with paying agencies.
• Carrying out further activities on the basis of specific agreements with the Regions and autonomous Provinces.
• Access to SIAN databases for managing user data.

In particular, CAA LiberiAgricoltori s.r.l. carries out specific activities in the following sectors:
Arable land, Viticulture, Rural Development, Organic, UMA, Waste, Agritourism, Nitrates Directive, ATC-Territorial Hunting Areas, Irrigation.

Arable land:
Single Payment Application (PAC), company file maintenance, crop plans, cadastral inspections and plans, Agea control assistance, conditionality, title management.

Winemaking:
Application for wine declaration, procedures for updating the regional wine register.

Rural Development:
Contribution questions Agro-environmental measures, Compensatory allowance, Organic farming, keeping fertilizer and pesticide registers, coordination with ARUSIA.

Biological:
Application for registration in the regional list of organic operators, coordination with Control Bodies, preparation and updating of notifications.

UMA:
Application for subsidized diesel fuel, compilation of MOD 25, coordination with regional offices.

Waste:
Contracts with authorized disposal company (AP), coordination of disposal service, maintenance of loading and unloading registers, MUD, registration with SISTRI.

Agriturismo:
Registration in the regional register of agritourism operators, consultancy.

Nitrates Directive:
Assistance to companies located in Nitrate Vulnerable Zones (ZVN), computerized compilation of the Agronomic Use Plan (PUA), fertilizer and pesticide registers, grant applications.

ATC-Ambiti Territoriali di Caccia:
Domanda contributo stoppie e colture a perdere, planimetrie.

Damage from wild boars:
Questions about damages contribution and floor plans

Alto Tevere Irrigation Consortium (CIAT):
Management of 40-year license, annual consumption declaration, coordination of the Province.

Circulation of exceptional agricultural vehicles:
Requests for permits for the circulation of tobacco harvesters and agricultural tractors, Anas and Province.

Photovoltaic:
Information on the technical characteristics of the system, cost analysis and contributions.

Fattoria Autonoma Tabacchi provides its members with services using agricultural machinery for soil preparation operations (subsoiling, ploughing, weeding, harrowing), for crop protection (self-propelled sprayers), for hydraulic management of the land (diggers, excavators) and for harvesting (packaging machines).

The distribution of plant protection products is carried out with self-propelled sprayers equipped with air sleeves that allow for maximum operator safety and respect for the surrounding environment.

In recent years, combined and minimum tillage machines have been purchased which, when combined with high-powered tractors, result in savings in tillage costs (lower energy consumption) and allow for a conservative action on the structure of agricultural land (higher organic substance content and less trampling).

The company also provides the equipment needed to carry out the various agricultural operations in the various cultivation areas (Service Units); these machines operate in combination with the tractors owned by the members.

The above is carried out by the subsidiary Fattoria Agri & Service

FAT has 674 dryers and 10,000 baskets for curing, 26 basket packaging plants, a carton preparation plant, 26 carton presses and 60 conveyors for unloading dry tobacco, all located in 18 Service Units.
The total curing capacity of the cooperative is 5500/6000 tons of tobacco.
FAT provides its members with the service of loading and curing tobacco in special containers designed for the curing of machine-harvested tobacco.
The container loading systems are automatic, designed and developed within the same cooperative.
The dryers, where the full containers are placed, are constantly monitored by efficient automatic controls that allow us to adjust the curing parameters, and maintain the set values, perfectly.
The unloading of the dryers is the responsibility of the Members in all the centres, except one, where a team of FAT employees takes care of this operation.

The TECHNICAL MEANS WAREHOUSE of the Fattoria Autonoma Tabacchi offers a service of certain interest to the Member, in order to best cover all the agronomic needs of its crops, respecting the environment. In this regard, it has the most modern and efficient range of products, selected by the Agronomic Directorate of the FAT for their characteristics of technical validity and compliance with the residue limits set by the strict regulations of international buyers. The technical means are supplied to the Member at the most competitive prices and in the easiest logistic packages, also for the purposes of their correct disposal. All materials are stored in full compliance with current regulations and, when necessary, the Member can also find extensive information on the correct doses and methods of use of the various products, perhaps by resorting to orientation courses specifically organized by the FAT. The objective is in fact to combine the agronomic efficiency of the treatments carried out with the lowest doses of the products in order to maximum respect for the health of the operator and the environment.
The above is managed by the Pro-Agri Affiliate

Our company, among the many services it offers to its members, based on requests previously received from the Members and the company's needs, also organizes the management of personnel in the most demanding phases of tobacco cultivation (trimming and harvesting) and in the winter period where the personnel is engaged in the industrial phase of sorting and threshing the tobacco.

From an employment point of view, FAT is organised as follows:

• Approximately 70 temporary workers are employed in the company for 11 months a year, carrying out various tasks, from normal maintenance operations and preparation of the various production phases, to more professional ones such as mechanical repairs, the operation of vehicles and machines and the control and supervision of all production cycles;

• a further group of temporary staff is assigned to the operations of trimming, packaging of green tobacco in baskets and preparation of dry tobacco (agricultural phase). In the summer phase the number of employees reaches approximately 250 units. It is in this period that there is maximum optimization of human resources given that the cultivation requires a great deal of work.
• a third group made up of personnel who are usually employed by the Members in the summer period, are always employed in the winter period by the processor for the sorting and threshing of the tobacco.

It is in this phase that the circle is squared: work is offered to a suitable number of people who would otherwise be unemployed and the partner will be able to employ the same employees when the agricultural phase resumes. Correct and careful management of personnel allows for production costs to be contained and at the same time a better service to be achieved.

FAT produces over 35 million seedlings every year in its greenhouses using the Float system technique.
The sowing of the plateaux is done with a precision seeder and uses new plateaux every year, the old ones are collected and recycled for the production of material mainly used in construction.
For the treatments and mowing operations of the seedlings, special machinery is used, developed and built within our organization, semi-automatic and remote-controlled.
The production of the seedlings is located in 8 centers in order to be close to the cultivation areas.

At the end of the cycle, members come to collect containers, specially filled with trays, and take them to the field for transplanting.
At the end of the transplant, the empty trays, duly packaged, are taken back to the greenhouses and prepared to be collected and recycled.