Innovations will be shown that sustainably increase and secure business success. On the other hand, the solutions contribute to the further improvement of animal welfare and environmentally-friendly production conditions, as well as the working conditions. Additionally, international expertise from industry, farming, science and consultation is present at EuroTier. With its unique information offer, EuroTier provides orientation for managing the current and future tasks in agricultural livestock husbandry. It is the international future forum for modern animal production and the most important impulse generator for the individual farmer as much as for the entire industry.
2,523 exhibitors from 57 countries will provide a complete offer for all areas of modern animal production. With this, EuroTier reports a new record number of registrations. The registration numbers have increased by approximately 4 percent when compared with the previous record result of four years ago. The exhibition area has also reached a new record size with more than 280,000 m2. Therefore, the professional animal keepers from all over the world are offered even more information than ever before.
Outstanding contribution from abroad
Companies from abroad are solely responsible for the increase in exhibitor numbers. With 1,453 companies (58 percent), foreign firms are represented more strongly than never before. The majority of the exhibitors from abroad come from the Netherlands (231 companies). Large contributions are also made by China (179), France (148), Italy (133), Denmark (86), Spain (78), Great Britain (69), Turkey (62), Belgium (55), Austria (54) and Poland (47). DLG sees this high foreign contribution as a clear sign of the continuing global alignment of the enterprises and the agricultural economics with their international interrelations. The firms want to make targeted use of the EuroTier platform to open up new markets.
High information requirement of animal producers
The amount of information required by animal producers is still high. Farm and herd managers require the most modern and professional concepts to make their farms fit for the future. This applies to all questions in the areas breeding, feeding, husbandry, management, logistics and especially in the areas animal health and animal welfare. Solutions required for a yield increase along the entire value added chain, from production to the end product. At EuroTier, the latest findings and approaches are discussed in many professional lectures and discussion rounds on all the exhibition days. As the Bundesverband Praktizierender Tierärzte (bpt, Federal Association of Practising Veterinary Surgeons) will be holding its annual congress again at the same time as the EuroTier on the trade fair area in Hanover, there will be an intensive exchange of opinions between veterinarians and farmers from all over the world on questions of animal health.
Challenge nutrition
The challenge to feed ten billion people in the future - with food in sufficient amounts and quality - has not changed, neither has the increasing demand for agricultural products for energy and material supplies. That the global demands for agricultural products, for food, fuel, and fibre will double in the coming decades is well-known and remains the challenge for the agricultural industry. This challenge can only be answered by a modern agriculture. This will need to apply technological innovations and methods and with them efficiently utilise the scarcest factors of all, the fertile arable land and grassland areas, while at the same time minimising the load on the environment.
Spirits in European farming still dampened
German farmers still view the current economic situation cautiously. This is shown by the preliminary results of the current DLG trend monitor from autumn 2016. Even though the prices for slaughter pigs have clearly increased, pig keepers are emerging from a one-year-long phase of low prices. Dairy farmers are still in a difficult price situation, where securing liquidity is in the foreground. Cash crop producers must be prepared for a phase of low prices, as the globally large grain harvest, especially in the Black Sea region, is leading to price pressure. Against this background, German, French and Polish farmers still view the current economic situation cautiously. However, British farmers are happier with the economic situation than they were even in spring 2016.
British farmers more confident again
As the DLG trend monitor further points out, the German and Polish farmers continue to have cautious expectations for the business development in the next twelve months. The business prospects of farmers in France have also deteriorated considerably. The by far below average harvest there, is causing incomes to drop, especially those from grain exports. Furthermore, the situation of the dairy and pig farmers continues to be tense.
In Great Britain, the farmers are clearly more confident about future business development. The Brexit decision is coupled to hopes for farming with fewer stipulations, even if it is unclear, how well a renationalised agricultural policy will be financed.
Regressive willingness to invest in Germany, France, and Poland
Farmers in Germany, France, and Poland are planning to invest less in the coming twelve months. A different picture in Great Britain: The willingness to invest increased by 8 percent to the current 32 percent. In Germany, compared with the spring survey, the pig farmers reduced investments (minus seven per cent) as did cash crop farmers (minus seven per cent) and the dairy farmers (minus three per cent).
While dairy farmers in Britain are willing to invest more (plus ten per cent), the dairy farmers in France are further reducing their investments (minus seven per cent). The willingness to invest of the Polish dairy farmers is about stable when compared to the spring survey. All in all, the willingness of dairy farmers to invest remains below average in comparison with the last few years, as the current market situation does not allow much space for investment. Even though it seems that milk payouts have bottomed out, dairy farmers still have to be prepared for further months with low price levels until cost neutral prices are reached.
The willingness to invest also differs among the pig farmers: While the willingness to invest has risen by plus 19 per cent to now 40 per cent in Great Britain, the pig farmers have reduced their investment plans now by two per cent to now 37 per cent. German pig farmers reduced investments by minus three per cent to 38 per cent and only 15 per cent of the French pig farmers (minus ten per cent) are willing to invest. Following the low in prices in 2015/2016, the pig prices have now risen considerably. However, at the moment, securing liquidity and building up liquidity reserves is the focus of the farm managers. Furthermore, there is huge insecurity regarding the current controversial discussion about further development of the standards for animal welfare and the still not concluded discussion about the fertiliser ordinance. Farmers in Britain are hoping for better conditions on the national markets through Brexit.
Cash crop producers reduce their investments
In all the countries, the cash crop producers reduced their investments. As demonstrated by the DLG trend monitor, the willingness to invest drops in Germany by seven per cent to 30 per cent, in Great Britain by three per cent to 28 per cent, in France by six per cent to eight per cent and in Poland by three per cent to 36 per cent. Following the comfortable price levels for grains and oil seeds in the last years, the prices for wheat have dropped for the first time since 2011, to constantly below the price mark of 180 €/t. Although the price level is low in general, the cash crop producers hope to receive price premiums for quality cereals, as quality cereals overall are scarce. In the present price situation, the cash crop producers are also preparing themselves to secure the farm liquidity. Furthermore, the cash crop producers have in parts made extensive investments and renewed the machine park, so that the requirement for investments is currently assessed as being low.
The social environment plays an increasingly important role
Besides the market framework conditions, which orient themselves on supply and demand, the social environment of animal production is beginning to play an increasingly important role in the development and implementation of operational strategies of the animal producers. According to current figures from the DLG trend monitor Europe autumn 2016, the farm managers particularly in Germany are concentrating on improving the level of animal welfare of the animal holding systems. Furthermore, innovations in technology for requirement-oriented slurry application and procedures for determining the nutrient contents of slurry are of particular importance for them. The aim is to apply nutrients from farm-own fertilisers more efficiently and with fewer losses and at the same time improve the economic efficiency of the use of farm's own fertilisers as well as the environmental effects.
Energy Decentral 2016
Approximately 330 specialist exhibitors will take part in the EnergyDecentral 2016, the international specialist trade fair for innovative energy supply. This is a slight drop compared with 2014. The number of agricultural biogas plants is only growing very slightly under the current political framework conditions. However, in Germany alone, there is an enormous number of producing plants, which will contribute its constant share to regenerative energy production in the years to come. Optimisation, repowering and operation of the plants are clearly in the foreground. Besides this, internationally the interest in biogas is unbroken. World-wide, there is also a high potential for this area in the waste management area and many innovative developments advanced in the use of alternative substrates. Examples of this are straw, bagasse or residues from the food industry.
Many visitors expected
EuroTier is the world's leading trade fair for animal production. With its excellent and compact unique information offer, it will provide orientation for animal producers from all over the globe. The DLG expects a similar visitor volume to that of 2014, where around 156,000 experts visited EuroTier.
