While much farming know-how is developed through practical experience and peer networks, agricultural education plays a vital role, not only via its direct impact on the incoming generation, but also by shaping norms and attitudes throughout the industry. It can however, be hard for teaching programmes to keep up with emerging thinking, science and developments on the ground. The purpose of this retreat was to make it easier, helping the academics who lead agriculture degree courses to inject fresh content – inspiring, practically relevant and forward-looking – into their courses.
Across four days, individuals responsible for leading degree courses heard from a range of organisations, sharing resources that can be readily used within taught modules. These included videos, case studies, research, data and guest lecturers. This retreat provided an opportunity for organisations to share their work and insights with many of the next generation farm managers, advisors, policy-makers and leaders, via their degree programmes. A range of sectors, farming systems and issues were discussed. Some with a focus on policy, others on management and innovation. Strong themes throughout the programme included sustainable, regenerative and agroecological farming.
