Seasons greetings from the Secretariat

As 2024 starts to become a memory I wanted to take a moment and reflect on the last 12 months for the European Society of Agricultural Engineers.

We would like to go on the record to say how welcomed both Ann and I have been to the international agricultural engineering community and that we consider it a real honour to be able to serve.

To be able to experience the excellent AgEng2024 Conference in Athens, ably convened by the new President Professor Nikos Katsoulas, was great. We enjoyed being able to meet, face to face, many people who until that point were only faces on a Zoom/Teams call.

The whole range, depth and breadth of agricultural engineering was apparent at both the AgEng2024 and the VDI’s excellent Landtechnik conferences in Athens and Osnabruck respectively.

It’s a cliché to talk about how exciting agricultural engineering is, but it is, especially as we are already converts. The challenge is persuading others of the relevance of our discipline.

It doesn’t take long when looking at the mainstream news to realise how febrile societies are becoming, and that the root of a lot of unrest around the world is the control of water and good farmland. As climate change accelerates this will get worse.

Our challenge as agricultural and biosystems engineers is to give society the understanding and the tools to tackle these issues head on. I repeat, it’s a good time to be an engineer.

Closer to home, EurAgEng has launched the 2025 Awards (See https://eurageng.eu/?p=288 ) so if you know and would like to recognise an engineer of merit, please have a look.

Likewise the Society has also extended the deadline for expressions of interest to host the AgEng2028 conference and more details can be found here https://eurageng.eu/?p=219 .

As we close, it remains for us to wish you a very peaceful Christmas and a restful New Year.

We look forward to working with you in 2025.

Ann and Andy Newbold,  EurAgEng Secretariat

*Please note the office closes on Friday 20th December 2024 and reopens on Monday 6th January 2025

Follow me!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *