A national farming competition has opened again for this year with an aim to showcase the careers available within the industry.
Now in its fourth year, the annual initiative aims to open young peoples' eyes to agriculture's highly skilled and technologically advanced agri-careers.
The National Food, Farming and Natural Environment competition has been launched by LEAF Education, in partnership with Coleg Cambria Llysfasi and Bayer.
Entries are open to secondary schools, between Years 9-11, with teachers invited to submit an application explaining why they feel their school deserves a place in the competition.
Since launching in 2018, organisers say that more than a third of the students who took part had gone on to study at land-based colleges.
And all students involved had reported that taking part in the competition "positively changed their perception of the farming industry."
This year's theme is 'Farming is about working with the natural environment’, with an aim to engage students with farming, food production and the natural environment.
Carl Edwards, LEAF’s director said the competition had an aim to demonstrate and showcase the range of future career opportunities available within the sector.
“Last year we saw huge growth in the number of entries to the competition and during the process, it was wonderful to see a real change in students’ understanding of food production."
The competition will see entrants whittled down to ten semi-finalist schools who will undertake on-farm visits, followed by a final activity filled weekend for the top six schools, at Coleg Cambria Llysfasi in North Wales.
Students will take part in hands-on farm activities, with the weekend culminating in a debate around a farming related hypothesis on the role soil has in sustainable food production.
The winning school will be crowned winner of the ‘National Competition in Food, Farming and Natural Environment 2022’.
Entries opened on 18 March, and will close on 8 April. Judging will take place on 27 April 2022.
The finals weekend will take place between 21-23 October 2022.
