32 years of sharing knowledge: from plant protection conference to crop congress

In 1984 the first plant protection conference was held at Hotel Nyborg Strand. The initiative was taken by principal Thorup and Knud Erik Thonke, Statens Ukrudtsforsøg (Danish Weed Studies), Flakkebjerg. The background for this initiative was the desire to disseminate knowledge to Danish advisers, farmers and chemical companies. The first plant protection conference was only about weeds. From 1985 the Danish Institute of Plant and Soil Science was included in order to contribute in the areas of diseases and pests. Throughout the years the number of participants remained stable at 600.

In 2003 the 20th plant protection conference marked the end because new action was taken. The background for this was rationalisation, i.e. a merging of a range of events, including national crop meetings, the autumn conference, Technique in Agriculture, Annual Potato Meeting and the plant protection conference. The idea was to not only achieve rationalisation but also to create a forum in which all interested farmers and others with relation to crop production could participate in a huge cornucopia of technical input. The initiators of this were, among others, Jørgen Jakobsen (DJF) and Carl Åge Petersen (Knowledge Centre for Agriculture).

Crop congress a success from the beginning

The first crop congress was held at Herning Kongrescenter in 2004. The crop congress has been a success since its inception. The number of participants the first time was around 1300 and has since then grown to almost 2000. The number of participants remained stable and high even during the years in which Denmark stood on the edge of a recession.

This is a clear indication that the crop congress is very important for researchers, farmers, advisers, business people, students, etc. who would like to acquire new technical knowledge as well as exchange experience with peers and across professional groups. There is no doubt that the social aspect is also an important parameter; meeting previous, present and future colleagues and collaborators is considered very important. Another important element is networking with decision-makers.

In my opinion the visibility of AGRO at the crop congress is extremely important. For some people, being a speaker is not particularly attractive because the talks are not peer reviewed and therefore do not give merit. However, many of the talks result in press coverage which is one way in which to brand AGRO.

AGRO very active at the crop congress

Unfortunately, there have been years when the number of talks given by AGRO has been at a critically low level. This seems to be a thing of the past now in that in 2016 AGRO participated with 22 talks, which is really impressive. AGRO also shows a strong front with regard to TAP with representation from 18 assistants who do a really professional job and of whom we can be proud.  

The extreme professionalism and energy of AGRO’s assistants were proven this year when a speaker suddenly fainted at the podium. Jytte Christensen and Karen Heinager and others quickly rushed to help and got the speaker up and standing again and believe it or not – after a sip of water and a short break he was able to give his talk.

There was, however, a small issue in 2016 that we need to address, namely the uneven branding of the organisers on e.g. notepads, pens and pause slides. SEGES is much more visible than KU and AU, so here we need to up ourselves.