Winners of the 2021 Agriculture and Horticulture Colleges Challenges Event

Teagasc is happy to announce that the National College of Amenity Horticulture are the winners of the Agricultural Colleges Challenges Event 2021. The Agricultural Colleges Challenges is a longstanding inter college, skills challenge competition, supported by Macra na Feirme. The competition has fostered a keen rivalry between colleges in its 40 year history.

Winners of the 2021 Agriculture and Horticulture Colleges Challenges Event

The challenges which involved over 90 contestants, took place over two evenings and was made possible this year through the use of technology and the experience gained by Teagasc running virtual online classes and events over the past 12 months. 

The competition focussed on specialist skills including stock judging, evaluation of confirmation, plant and tree identification.  The second event involved participation in a quick-fire Kahoot quiz. 

John Martin Carroll, Macra na Feirme Agriculture Development Officer, who used his experience of online competitions to run the event, said: “I determined that this important event would continue.  It was a great pleasure to work with Teagasc to bring this event online this year. I had the pleasure of attending the 2020 event in Mountbellew Agriculture College and was impressed with the competition and energy generated by the event. I was therefore anxious that it would run this year.”

Joe Hanlon, Teagasc, welcomed the win by the team from the National College of Amenity Horticulture: “it is refreshing to see a competition which in recent years has been dominated by agricultural students won by a team of horticulturists from the Teagasc National College of Amenity Horticulture in the National Botanic Gardens. This is a long standing competition that challenges students to use their knowledge and skills acquired during their training, against their peers on a national stage.  It is wonderful that the tradition and spirit of the competition has continued despite the Covid restrictions”.

Teagasc courses have continued on schedule through remote delivery and the use of online technology. Programmes have concluded on time and applications are now open for full-time courses starting in September 2021.

The winners in the specialist skills were: