Agricultural Engineering and Technology Research within the 7th framework programme of European Commission
For the first time the sector of Agricultural Engineering in Europe has cooperated to formulate a vision about future developments and their corresponding necessary fields of research. For this task in 2006 representatives of industry, academic institutions, associations and the DG Research of the European Commission founded the working group Agricultural Engineering and Technology. The working group operates under the umbrella of the Technology Platform “MANUFUTURE“ and is in close contact with the EU Commission concerning questions of research funding within the 7th Framework Programme.
The European sector of agricultural engineering and technologies is currently the worldwide leader and with visionary research programmes that position should be held in the future. The AET working group published “Vision 2020“ and the “Strategic Research Agenda” as results of their work. Those documents describe the future fields of research, in which work is necessary, to assure the leading role of not only European agricultural engineering but also of European agriculture.
The EU Commission published the first call for the submission of project proposals of the 7th framework programme at the end of 2006. Various specific programmes were defined. The AET working group analysed the first call for the submission of research proposals, defined focal points, which are closely connected with agricultural engineering research, and compiled them in a document. According to the document opportunities for projects in agricultural engineering research exists especially in the fields of “Food, Agriculture and Fisheries, Biotechnology, ICT, Material and Production, Energy, Environment, Transport”
Vision 2020, the strategic research agenda, and the research proposal document were distributed within the sector and are available for download on the internet-site www.manufuture.org.
Information Workshop
Agricultural Engineering and Technologies
On 7 June 2007, the 2nd workshop of the Agricultural Engineering and Technology working group took place in Brussels to exchange information and experiences. Ten European countries were represented with participants from agricultural engineering companies, academic institutes, associations and the GD Research of the European Commission. The European sector of agricultural engineering and technology was informed about activities of the AET working group within the Technology Platform "Manufuture". Also the EU-Commission was made aware of research needs in the sector. The possibilities for collaboration with the Technology Platforms "Biofuels", "Plants for the Future" and "Food for Life" were also investigated.
Representatives of the EU-Commission presented the strategic orientation of research programmes within FP7, especially in the areas NMP, Energy and Agriculture. It was stressed that project proposals from the Implementation Plan of the AET working group will be incorporated into calls in 2008/2009.
For more information please visit our website www.manufuture.org.
Status Report
June 2007
Click to download the status report in pdf format
Funding from FP7 for your research?
The European agricultural engineering industry, along with the scientific society of agricultural engineering and technology, formed the Agricultural Engineering and Technologies (AET) as part of the MANUFUTURE European Technology Platform (www.manufuture.org). The objective of MANUFUTURE (which represents the whole sector of mechanical engineering) and of AET is to ensure that the current research framework programme (FP7) of the European Union recognises the needs of technology, development and research.
Documents necessary for forming a Technology Platform, and including Vision 2020, Strategic Research Agenda (SRA) and the First Implementation Plan were prepared for the steering committee of the VDMA (the German Engineering Federation), the High-Level-Group (HLG) of MANUFUTURE and for the European Commission (EC) as well as the AET community.
A workshop was held in Brussels on 7 June 2007 which included several other Technology Platforms (TPs) and this was followed by a national conference of MANUFUTURE, held in September 2007 in Berlin. Research topics from the AET initiative were included (published in VDI Nachrichten) and the meeting launched an objective of ensuring that agricultural engineering topics would be in future calls of FP7.
A European conference of MANUFUTURE took place in December 2007 in Porto, Portugal, where Dr Ludger Frerichs (of VDI-MEG and EurAgEng) gave a presentation on the need for financial support of R&D activities.
The German agricultural engineering society, VDI-MEG, and VDMA are the driving forces behind AET. Industry involvement in the initiative is high, as indicated by the inclusion of Prof Peter Pickel of John Deere Mannheim, who represents AET in the MANUFUTURE High Level Group. Frank Knecht of the VDMA European Office in Brussels, is the representative on site with Jens Fehrmann (TU Dresden) coordinating the AET activities. VDMA and its members are kindly supporting Mr Fehrmann's activities.
Within AET there are four groups that, since early in 2008, have been
working on the second Implementation Plan for completion by mid 2008.
At a meeting of all Technology Platforms engaged in agricultural topics
(Knowledge Based Bio-Economy, KBBE, oriented TPs) with the appropriate
EC-Directorate in January 2008, it was agreed that AET will be incorporated
into a Coordination and Support Action (CSA) proposal of KBBE platforms.
The outcome is that it is highly likely that AET will become a recipient
of FP7 funding.
Furthermore, at a MANUFUTURE HLG meeting in March 2008 in Athens, discussions were held on MANUFUTURE applying for Joint Technology Initiative status. Basically JTIs are Private-Public Partnerships that will support large-scale multinational research activities. AET (and therefore VDI-MEG) as well as the VDMA would support such an initiative within MANUFUTURE. A first discussion with the EC has been held. Forming a JTI from 2010 is a possibility, but there will be strong competition from other TPs.
In the meantime AET is very optimistic that the EC will fund specific AET projects within FP7. At the suggestion of the EC Directorate responsible for industrial research, AET will organise a conference in Brussels with the objective of developing further AET topics within FP7. This conference will serve as a first stage for the formation of project consortia. The results of that conference will determine trends for the future development of the agricultural engineering and technology sector within MANUFUTURE ETP. The whole AET community, including VDI-MEG and VDMA, are expecting strong encouragement for the European agricultural engineering sector and for research in that area.
EurAgEng thanks the VDMA and VDI-MEG team for their efforts in promoting agricultural engineering within FP7 and EurAgEng asks its members to check the regular electronic newsletter for updates.