The economic situation is slowing down the agricultural machinery market at a global level, but the EIMA exhibition, which ended on 10 November in Bologna, suffered no setbacks and hit an all-time high attendance record.
EIMA International set a new record and closed the 2024 event with 1,750 exhibiting industries with 346,800 attendees, of which 63,100 were foreign guests from 150 different countries.
Over 60,000 models of vehicles, equipment and components – from tractors to combine harvesters, from soil processing equipment to treatment and harvesting machines, from forestry equipment to gardening and greenery maintenance equipment – were on display before a crowd of economic operators, farmers, contractors and technicians, as well as students and enthusiasts.
The spotlight was on robots, drones, digital technologies and artificial intelligence systems that represent the new frontier of agromechanics, and are already capable of responding to the challenges of food security, environmental sustainability and climate change.
“At EIMA we welcomed visitors from all over the world,” said Mariateresa Maschio, president of FederUnacoma, the Italian federation of manufacturers and organisers of EIMA. “We tried to analyse the evolution of demand in the traditional markets of Europe and America, in the emerging markets of India and China, and in the newly mechanized markets of Southeast Asia and Africa.Every region of the world has different agricultural models and the task of the agromechanical industry is to offer tailor-made solutions.”
“Our exhibition took place during a difficult time for the market, which is affected by the unfavorable economic situation, uncertainty on international markets and the transition to a new incentive system and yet the exhibition saw no crisis and had an extraordinary outcome,” added Simona Rapastella, general manager of FederUnacoma. “Anyone who works in agriculture knows that new technologies are indispensable – she added – and that it is necessary to get to see them up close and plan investments accordingly and, in short, to get to the heart of the ‘innovation factory’ and become active participants.”
