Students Ellen Doherty and Conor Farrell, both attending Kildalton Agricultural College, and Wayne Smith and Rosie O’Brien, students in Gurteen College, represented Ireland at the sixth Agro Challenge which took place in Nitra, Slovakia from, 15 to 18 August.

The team took home one silver medal, along with three bronze, for the agricultural skills they demonstrated across the four days.

This was the first time a Teagasc team has competed in the Agro Challenge.

About the competition

The Agro Challenge is a competition for full-time students of the green sector aged up to and including 25, who are current students of a school or institution that is a member of the national EUROPEA organisation.

The Irish team competed against 17 teams from countries including Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Estonia, France and Germany.

The students were accompanied by teachers Eva Hayes of Kildalton Agricultural College and Danielle Mulligan of Gurteen College. This Irish team’s participation was sponsored by FBD.

Assessing skills

The competition assessed the teams' capabilities across a number of agricultural skills, with 18 tasks being completed over the duration of the competition.

Each task had to be completed within the maximum time of 15 minutes. Competency in machinery skills was judged through tasks in stacking round and square bales, changing blades on a mounted disc mower, changing wheels, tractor driving with both a trailer and water tank, and log splitting.

The teams were tested on animal husbandry through animal assessments to determine liveweight, the preparation of an animal ration, hand milking and milk quality assessments.

Furthermore, the students were required to carry out tasks in crop agronomy, focusing on identifying different crop plants and their seeds, and the identification of diseases, insect pests and weeds.

Bringing home the bacon

The categories in which the team secured medals in were silver in driving a Kramer with a water tank and bronze in hand milking, changing blades on a mounted disk mower and log splitting.

Commenting on the participation of students from Teagasc agriculture colleges, Teagasc head of education Dr Anne-Marie Butler praised the Irish team for their wonderful performance in Slovakia.

“International events like this are a powerful learning initiative for students and offer new and exciting experiences for all. Well done to Rosie, Ellen, Conor and Wayne who represented Ireland so proudly.”