Participants aim at ploughing as cleanly and as precisely as possible, which was particularly difficult this year due to the dry conditions.
16 farmers competed against each other in this year’s challenge. Each had a specific area to cover and was evaluated based on accuracy, explained Jil Thorn, president of the southern section of the Agricultural Youth: “The goal is to be precise and clean. They each get a rectangular and a triangular shape to plough, after which we decide on a winner.”
The dryness of the soil made it challenging to properly plough the highlighted areas, noted Frank Muller from the central section of the Agricultural Youth: “It works, but it isn’t clean at all.” The precision of this process is crucially important, as flaws can cause problems in a field for an entire year.
Luc Emering, president of the Young Farmers’ Association, also expressed concerns over the dry conditions, which may affect produce safety and prevent farmers from cultivating the same plants as they used to do: “Maybe this will open other doors and allow us to grow things that never survived, like soy or sunflowers. We might have to work with plants that have more massive root systems.”
According to representatives from the sector, this year’s drought should remain unproblematic as there are enough reserves from previous years. However, they hope that next summer will be different so that the soil has a chance to recover.
