Kleve/Kamp-Lintfort, 16 June 2014: As part of a field trip on the topic of ‘Characteristics and Structure of the Agricultural Sector in Eastern Germany’, students from the Faculty of Life Sciences travelled to eastern Germany. The programme began with a lecture at the University of Göttingen by Dr Sebastian Lakner, a research fellow at the university’s Institute for Agricultural Economics and Rural Development, which provided an introduction to current developments in German organic farming.
The students then visited Erfurt University of Applied Sciences. Staff from the Faculty of Horticulture introduced the students to the university’s degree programmes and research projects. The students were particularly impressed by the opportunities for teaching and research in the modern greenhouses at Erfurt University of Applied Sciences.
This was followed by several farm visits. Whilst the focus at ‘Rabe GmbH’ in Lübbenau was on the production and marketing of Spreewald gherkins, the visits to ‘Kindelbrücker Obstbau eG’ and ‘NOGA Agrar GmbH’ in Letschin, the students were particularly interested in the organisational structure and the challenges involved in managing large agricultural enterprises.
“The agricultural holdings in the Lower Rhine region are predominantly family-run farms ranging in size from 50 to 100 hectares. Owing to the different developments in East Germany following the Second World War, much larger estates – run collectively or by the state – were established there. The agricultural holdings newly established in the 1990s are therefore many times larger than the typical Lower Rhine family farm,” says student Alison Marie Arico.
To round off the field trip, the students saw examples of urban agriculture, such as the so-called ‘Prinzessinnengärten’ in Berlin-Kreuzberg. “There, residents volunteer to grow vegetables on public land to supply their neighbourhood with organic produce. For example, they plant in portable boxes so they can move them around as and when needed. This is an interesting model for creating sustainable cycles in urban areas,” says Arico.
The excursion was led by Prof. Dr Dietrich Darr, Professor of Agribusiness, and Prof. Dr habil. Jens Gebauer, Professor of Sustainable Agricultural Production Systems, specialising in horticulture, at Rhine-Waal University of Applied Sciences.
