The project brings together partners from three countries / regions in which both the technologies in agriculture and the digitization of processes are very different: Thuringia with its relatively large farms and Malopolska with more small-scale farms, Estonia with its high degree of digitization and great acceptance of digital applications. There should be an exchange between the partners about the current curriculum for a farmer and animal farmer taking into account the following aspects: • Location of agricultural enterprises/farms in the partner regions along the innovation chain from control / regulation via automation - smart farming - digital farming up to shared economy farming and as a result VET requirements, • Balancing between ecology and economy and the resulting requirements for competencies of skilled work force, attitudes and awareness of the options for farmers' own contribution to this and the requirements for training to acquire them. The primary objective of the exchange is to bring the partners' state of knowledge to a high level, to present exemplary developments in the countries, to give impulses for ideas and actions, to trigger initiatives in their own work. Target groups for the exchange project in the sense of the partnership are training institutions (managers, teachers), associations and networks of agricultural holdings as well as structures that develop, evaluate or confirm VET content (curricula). In addition, it is planned to include political and stately institutions, which are important for the project and the development of Agriculture 4.0. In this regard the partner’ options und those of the cooperating structures within the frame of the project have to be taken into account. The project addresses two sectors: the training area and agriculture. The primary benefit for the training institutions is the presentation of successful development examples to the partners and feedback on their own area of responsibility, as well as knowledge about the development stages of Agriculture 4.0 and the resulting training requirements.
As a result, an increase in knowledge was achieved through the exchange of information, best practice solutions and exemplary developments, which was reflected on the basis of feedback at the meetings. The willingness of those involved in the project to deal with the new requirements of Agriculture 4.0 and to draw conclusions for their own actions could be forced. There was a feedback of the presented development examples and action-guiding analyzes on one's own area of responsibility, in the discussions and summaries. A network of project partners and participating institutions was formed to utilize the results of the project. With regard to the requirements for training, the following priorities were set: The training of agricultural specialists should have an educational module for the development of entrepreneurial spirit for their own work and responsible environment in addition to specialist content in order to acquire awareness and design skills with regard to requirements from environmental protection, digitization and extensive land use. The partners decided to submit a follow-up project to develop the training content mentioned.
Agriculture faces a variety of challenges. In view of the effects of unchecked population growth, climate change, species extinction, land use and the resulting trade restrictions on agricultural products, modern agriculture must make its contribution to innovative solutions. Digitization is one side, another is the intensive use of resources and a third is environmental protection. As a result, there is a need to enable skilled workers in agriculture to master these challenges and develop an awareness of urgently needed changes through appropriate vocational training. The project partners thought it was time to start an exchange of experiences on existing solutions and new results. So the need developed to deal with new technologies in agriculture, with perspective challenges and their impact on vocational training, in order to raise the level of knowledge of the partners to a high level, to present developments in the partner countries, to provide impetus for ideas and initiatives in the to give own action.