Climate change and destruction of the environment are existential dangers to Europe and the world. This is why Europe needs a new growth strategy if the transition to a modern, resource-efficient and competitive economy is to succeed where until 2050 no more net greenhouse gas emissions will be released, the economic growth will be decoupled from the use of resources and nobody – neither man nor region – will be let down.

Michael Horsch, Philipp Horsch and Theo Leeb discuss with Guido Höner from the agricultural trade magazine top agrar.

Stabilisation of carbon by means of the compost process according to Witte with the objective to keep the highest possible amount of carbon in the cycle. 

Successful no-till farming in Central Germany. 20 years of experience with the cultivation of cereals and rape.

Field crops   Agronomic, financial and environmental assessment of the deployment of French mixed-crop farms in Conservation farming. 

Which methodology should be applied to switch to Conservation farming without a transition period? 

HORSCH accepted the challenge and put it into practice among other in the Leeb plant protection technology…

Modern and innovative solutions for more precision and efficiency for modern and target-oriented plant protection. Jens Fehl and Max Plappert present innovations and solutions of the plant protection technology.
 

Let’s have a look at the origination process, the sales and the logistics of spare and wear parts. We will take you along to the Sitzenhof, our headquarters. From here, spare and we

In addition to mechanical weed management, hoeing and harrowing of crops has several positive effects. This increases the interest for these products among farmers at home and abroad. The machines are no longer only used with row widths of 75 cm for maize, but more and more often also with row widths of 50 cm and 25 cm and partly even with narrower row widths.

Andreas Bogner, Johannes Schmidt and Roman Scheller present the innovations and their experiences in this sector.

Contextualization of Biological Agents in Practice, changes that have occurred in the last decade in Brazil with regard to their use in the production of large cultures, explanation of how Grupo Progresso has been using control bivalents in daily life, opportunities, challenges, costs reduction and benefits observed in biological management and future steps that the group intends to develop. 

Gustavo Herrmann about integrated pest management and disease management in grains and sugar cane in Brazil, sustainability trends in large-scale crops and the use of professional biological control as a management tool.

The objective is to increase the share of organic products in the total sales revenue of the German agricultural sector to 30 % within the next 10 years.

The question is: Is the market ready for a significant increase in organic products - will the marketing of organic crops be able to keep up with it?

In the panel discussion:

• Stefanie Strebel - KS Agrar GmbH and Ceresal GmbH ("The CO₂ footprint is getting more and more important for consumer goods and especially for food. This is a great opportunity for domestic agriculture, especially in the organic sector..."),
• Jörg Große-Lochtmann – marketing corporation of the Naturland Bauern AG
• Klaus Bergmann - Bergmann GmbH ("Partner of agriculture for more than 70 years, international organic grain trade for 20 years - transparency and competence in organic farming").
• Christof Mross - Lidl ("We at Lidl want to bring organic farming and its products into the centre of our society").
• and Michael Horsch (managing director of HORSCH Maschinen GmbH)

Hoeing offers more flexibility with regard to the weed stages and is not dependent of the weather!

Werner Kübler discusses with Michael Horsch about the topic: "Will the diesel continue to be the top performer in the field?"

AT MAN Werner Kübler is responsible for the development and predevelopment in the sectors navy, railway, industry, power generation, agricultural engineering (market volume of up to 10,000 motors/year in the range between 50 and 2000 hp). 

How is the quality of the components for HORSCH machines defined? And how can you make sure that the specified requirements on the components are observed by the suppliers?

How are the functionally relevant characteristics checked resp. how are the components qualified?

Theresa Schmidmeier looks into these questions and gets support from Dr. Johann Neidl (Unit Purchasing and Digitalization) and Marius Kosz (Quality Management).

Whether it is about operating certain machine functions via the smartphone or transmitting telemetry data – these are only a few examples of how networked agricultural engineering already is!

What is the potential of the digitisation of work processes, what are the chances that result from it? Theresa Schmidmeier will explain what is behind the term HorschConnect!

Cultivation of soya in Germany: Ferenc Kornis gives a summary about sowing, fertilisation and plant protection.

In recent years the practice of intercropping has been gaining traction around the world as farmers rediscover the benefits of more diverse cropping systems. This presentation will outline some of the ecological principles and in-field practice of intercropping and also highlight the changes that occur to soil health and pest pressure from the small transition of one to two crop species. 

About the way on intercropping and nutrition Farming at the Wecker Farm in Regina Plains where his family strive to optimize the health of their plants by applying micronutrients as needed. They also use organic soil amendments, such as compost extract, fish fertilizer, kelp, molasses and humates to stimulate the biology in the soil. They have a diverse crop rotation that includes up to 13 different crops, many of which are intercropped.  They also use companion crops and cover crops on nearly the entire farm.  

Part of the developments of the HORSCH Maschinen GmbH are tested at AgroVation – while at the same time the work at the farm has to be carried out as usual. All that with a limited number of employees, at a site that is very frequented by tourists and in the face of the general societal and political pressure. These are topics which we consider to be positive challenges.