Last week, Agriland travelled to Clermont Ferrand in France for the annual Sommet de l’Élevage agricultural show.

The event features an impressive livestock exhibition as well as a range of machinery, and also allows businesses offering farmer solutions, a platform to showcase their products and ideas.

Agri-industry stakeholders from across the world travel to the event which offers visitors from other countries an 'International Lounge' to meet, network and discuss business solutions.

Each year, the Sommet de l’Élevage hosts a particular country as a guest of honour and, following on from Mongolia in 2022 and Georgia in 2023, Kazakhstan was this year’s guest country of honour at the show.

As well as the many Irish farmers who travelled to the event, there were a number of Irish businesses in attendance also and Agriland caught up with just some of these to hear how their products are being received by the French market.

Therese Malanaphy from M-Tec Engineering based in Swanlinbar, Co. Cavan, explained that the Irish business sold its first trailers to mainland Europe at the event.

John Murphy from Murphy Precast in Co. Wexford said that the company has been exporting precast concrete products to France "for a number of years".

The company were showcasing concrete drinkers, feed troughs and tractor weight blocks at the event.

Fearghail Connolly from Malone Farm Machinery based near Claremorris, Co. Mayo said this was the company's first time exhibiting at the show and their French-based machinery importer Hugo Peltre was also there.

This is the first year his business has been importing Malone machinery and he said that the machinery is proving popular with French farmers for grass management and grass harvesting.

Some of the Irish-made equipment and machinery on show at Sommet:

Francis Merrigan from Abbey Machinery explained that the Nenagh, Co. Tipperary-based machinery company was at the event to expand its brand name awareness in the French market.

Patrick Briody from Dromone Engineering in Oldcastle, Co. Meath, detailed that the business was showcasing pick-up hitches and excavator hitches at the event.

The annual event ran from Tuesday, October 1 until Friday, October 4, and the 2024 event was the 33rd edition of the show.