Online EuroTier 2021: 1,400 exhibitors

The initial EuroTier show should have been held in Hanover, Germany in November 2020, but due to Covid-19, it got postponed to February 2021. When situations did not structurally improve, the German Agricultural Society (DLG) managed to set up an entire online version of the show. At a press conference on December 3, the DLG explained in more detail what can be expected – and also tested the online platform with online presentations.

900 international booths

It was announced that even in its online variety, the show will showcase about 1,400 booths, of which the majority (around 500) hails from Germany. Yet the show managed to keep its international focus as there will be 900 international exhibitors. Topping the list is the Netherlands with 143, then 109 from France, followed by Italy (80), China (59), Spain (57), Denmark (53), Turkey (48), Belgium (40), Great Britain (30), Poland (28), the USA (27) and Austria (55).

More on what the digital edition of EuroTier will encompass can be read in this earlier article

In recent years, the offline editions of EuroTier usually attracted around 160,000 visitors from all over the planet.

2020: Bad to very bad for swine producers

Dr Reinhard Grandke, CEO of the DLG, painted a gloomy picture of 2020. He preented the results of the DLG-Agrifuture Insights surveys, which is monitoring trends in agriculture.

Looking to 2020, he said, the profit expectations of pig farms are rated as “bad” to “very bad”. He said, “Which is to be expected in view of the situation with African Swine Fever (ASF) as well as the outbreak of Covid-19 in slaughterhouses earlier this year. Liquidity is in many cases very tight and the prospects when the markets return to normality are also rated as poor.”

Innovations in agriculture

Normally, EuroTier is a place where many new innovations in livestock agriculture are being shown and the 2021 edition is no different. In total, 80 innovations were submitted for review and eventually 8 were announced to be prize winners – 1 gold medal and 7 silver medals. Unfortunately for the swine industry, none of the swine-related innovations were awarded a prize – instead 5 went to the dairy industry, 2 will be handed out to poultry innovations and 1 applied to manure distribution on the field.

The gold medal will be awarded to the CowToilet by the company Hanskamp AgroTech, from the Netherlands, allowing to separate urine in an intelligent manner.

The special ‘Animal Welfare Award’ is being given to Futuro Farmings Calf Monitoring System. That prize also won 1 of the 7 silver medals. The Animal Welfare Award is handed out since 2018.

Prof Dr Matthias Schick announcing the prize winners in the digital environment that will also be used during EuroTier 2021.

Pig farming: production security and efficiency optimisation

In a presentation, on behalf of the innovation committee, Prof Dr Matthias Schick from Switzerland touched on the trends that were observed in the innovations in swine farming. He mentioned that automation has been introduced much earlier than in other animal species.

He added, “Therefore, the trends are now more in the direction of production security and optimisation of feeding, climate control and energy efficiency. As there is a social trend towards demanding more animal welfare, a tendency in this direction is also evident in the number of registrations with straw automats, additional roughage automats and more employment opportunities.”