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Ploughing 2020: Catch up online this year

Sadly, the 89th National Ploughing Championship has been cancelled due to Covid-19 and we will have to go without meeting you in person for this year, writes FRS.

The event would normally give us the opportunity to reconnect with our customers, chat to new faces and showcase the many services we have to offer to farmers and the wider public, so instead, we are inviting you to catch up with us online.

The annual event, which attracts 297,000 visitors and 1,700 exhibitors, offers our FRS team a chance to exhibit our wide range of products and launch new services.

As Europe’s biggest outdoor event, it gives a great day out and is a ‘must-attend’ event in many calendars.

It is the second time in three years that the National Ploughing Championships has been disrupted as it was cancelled for a day due to storm Ali in 2018. Also, due to Foot and Mouth disease, it was cancelled in 2001.

However, this year, we are encouraging people not to miss out and to catch up with many exhibitors, including FRS, on the NPA social media channels to get the latest offers and news.

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FRS has taken a stand at the National Ploughing Championships for over 35 years. Like most businesses, we started out small and grew our presence at the event year-on-year.

Initially, the focus of the stand was to cater for visitors providing tea and food, and over the years we progressed to more live demonstrations.

From strength-to-strength 

Throughout the years, FRS has contributed to the event with valuable advice, new services, and practical demonstrations.

In 2013, FRS were positioned very nicely across from RTÉ and our model cow, FReSia, was the focus of their lenses and also our newly launched Herdwatch App for farmers made the news that year.

In 2014, we also made the front pages by launching our Best Practice in Milking QQI course with a mini operational milking parlour outside our marquee. Likewise, when pesticide training was due to become compulsory in 2015, we set up an outdoor sprayer to demonstrate elements of our FRS training spraying course, which filled our courses for many months after the event.

Along the way, we picked up the NPA and Enterprise Ireland Innovation Award for our Herdwatch app and have taken part in the innovation arena each year since, including this year as the event will take place virtually.

Farm safety has always been an important focus for us at many events.

At the 2012 National Ploughing Championship in Wexford, we attracted the RTE Nationwide and Newstalk teams to our safe tractor driving skills competition which we ran with schools and celebrities throughout the 3 days.

Over the years, FRS has managed the Farm Safety demonstrations at the HSA stand, which are an important feature of the show each year.

Weather conditions during the event have proven to be very diverse over the years, for example in 2017 our stand and marquee was flooded, in 2018 storm Ali’s winds stopped the show in its tracks, then the sun shone brightly on us all in 2019, while we presented our new branding.

Throughout the years, FRS Fencing has been the main fencing contractor for the entire show and our team worked through all the weather events with the NPA to get the site prepared and safe for show day and were instrumental in the clean up after flood and storm damage.

This year, we are looking forward to connecting with you online.

Make sure to like and follow the NPA’s Facebook page and @NPAIE and also keep an eye out on our Facebook and Twitter pages and Herdwatch’s Facebook and Twitter.

‘Ploughing 2021’

We will all hope to be back for the Ploughings’ 90th year in 2021, which is planning to be a 4-day event as the NPA host the Ploughing World Championships – Hope to see you all there!

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