The FTMTA Farm Machinery Show 2015 took place at Punchestown Racecourse on 5-7th February.
When the event was last held in 2013 there were 18,000 visitors over the three days and FTMTA CEO Gary Ryan was hoping for an even larger number this year.

Enterprise Ireland Toronto helped client company Samco Systems to organise an itinerary for their five Canadian dealers who travelled to Ireland for the show.

On Wednesday 4th February the group travelled to the Lyon’s Estate where Dr. Bridget Lynch (UCD School of Agriculture and Food Science) presented to the group on Irish Agriculture, covering specifically the dairy industry and the role of forage maize. The presentation was followed by a tour of the research farm where Dairymaster Moo Monitors, Richard Keenan and Co vertical mixers and Easyfix mats and stalls were all seen.

On February 5th the group travelled to the Farm Machinery Show for Day 1 of the event. They walked the show in the morning, followed by a tour of the show with Michael Moroney of the Irish Farmers Journal.

Michael started with a brief introduction to Irish agricultural machinery and then guided the group through Pavilion 1, 2 and 3 to point out Irish companies of interest. In particular for the Canadian visitors, they were very interested in Richard Keenan & Co, Major Equipment International and baling companies such as McHale and Tanco.

An evening reception was held in the President’s Suite for all 29 international visitors to the show. Neil O Sullivan, Enterprise Ireland welcomed the group to Ireland. Gary Ryan, CEO FTMTA, gave a brief overview of the Farm Machinery Show history and thanked Enterprise Ireland for organising the international group of visitors. When dinner was over the visiting Canadian and international dealers were invited to have one last walk around the show where Irish exhibitors had waited after the public left, to facilitate one to one meetings.

Friday 6th saw the European visitors travel to a farm for the morning, while the Canadian visitors travelled to Adare with the Samco team. The international visitors were very interested in the Irish companies they met with and impressed by the machinery they saw at the show and on the farm visits.