Funding for the chair in Agricultural Machinery and New Technologies

Founded in 2015 at the Institut Polytechnique UniLaSalle, the chair in Agricultural Machinery and New Technologies has the triple objective of anticipating changes in agriculture and new technologies to design agricultural equipment closely matching farmers’ needs, create new research capacity and train its engineering students in both agronomy and engineering.

The first three years were taken up in establishing the chair, with some notable successes:

• creation of a specialist program in Agricultural Equipment and New Technologies (AENT) with a first intake of students in 2016;
• recruitment of a team of researchers who also teach and an engineer specializing in plant experimentation;
• initial research projects on agricultural equipment.

The Michelin Corporate Foundation, which contributed to establishing the chair, has been encouraged by these favorable results and has wished to renew its backing for a second phase of consolidation and development.

Among the actions which have been undertaken at this stage are:

• giving shape to an ambitious and innovative science program for 2020 to 2023 designed to meet the major development challenges of the profession,
• building up student numbers in the AENT program with the key aim of offering graduates excellent employment prospects and professional recognition,
• reinforcing the teaching and research team,
• achieving recognition for the chair’s scientific work,
• publication in November 2020 of the first research thesis funded by the chair.

For example, this thesis on soil root compaction has provided a novel method of measuring the impact of farm machines passing over roots in the soil and is a significant contribution to the development of sustainable farming practices.

The Michelin Corporate Foundation is pleased to be involved in supporting agriculture and to be funding the chair whose objective is to respond to the major environmental, digital and energy challenges facing farm machinery today and tomorrow.