International.
During their visit to Europe, a group of experts from the Chilean government learned about how agriculture can be organized in adverse weather conditions. These experts visited the fan manufacturer Ziehl-Abegg in southern Germany to learn about energy efficiency in greenhouses. The delegation was led by Etel Latorre Varas, director of the Ministry of Agriculture in the Magallanes Region.
One of the reasons for the visit is that in Chile there have been difficulties in producing food for climatic reasons, especially in the Magallanes and Chilean Antarctic region, in the south of the country.
Therefore, to avoid the use of expensive and harmful transport with the environment, we want to increase local food production with the use of greenhouses. Representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture and the private sector visited Europe to see first-hand what the greenhouses of the future will look like. The Chilean-German Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Camchal) included leading companies and institutions in its program of visits. The group was led by Etel Latorre Varas, who chairs the government's agricultural authorities for the Magallanes region.
In Germany, the Spaniard Alfredo Rodríguez Rincón, engineer of Ziehl-Abegg, presented to visitors the more than 100 years of experience of the company in the construction and development of durable and efficient engines. Together with product manager Martin Mink, he spoke about the saving potential of greenhouses when modern technology is introduced. He also explained the German company's distribution and service network in South America.
Achim Kärcher, Laboratory Manager at Ziehl-Abegg, presented the intensive and precise testing processes and, at the same time, explained the advantages of rapid prototyping with 3D printers. The pinnacle of the visit was the walk through the acoustically isolated chamber, tests: with 1250 tons mounted on steel springs, this combined test bench for fans is the largest in the world.
This informative trip was organized by Camchal within the framework of the Smart Energy Concepts Chile project, a project of the German Ministry of the Environment funded by the International Initiative against Climate Change (IKI, for its acronym in German). Its objective is to reduce CO2 emissions in the agricultural and food sector through the implementation of energy efficiency measures.
