Agricultural and Construction
Equipment
AGRICULTURAL MACHINES EVOLUTION IN A CHANGING WORLD
AgEng2008 – International Conference on Agricultural Engineering
Giuseppe GAVIOLI - CNH Tractor Product
Crete, 23 June 2008
INTRODUCTION
We are in a changing world.
And the changes, even in far distant areas, are more and more correlated
(globalization effect).
So we will focus today mainly on Europe (now extended to 27 member states), but we
cannot lose contact with the rest of the world.
What is relevant to observe is that a lot of apparently independent changes are
causing economic, environmental and social trends with combined relevant effects on
the evolution of agricultural machines.
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BASIC STATISTICS
Our world is rapidly changing. The continuous evolution of society, economy, technology
and culture is under our eyes, and if we give a closer look to some statistic key indicators
we can better understand the size and direction of change.
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Demographics
Agricultural labor force
Cultivated land
Organic land
Farm size evolution
Climate change and precipitations evolution
Gross Domestic Product
Agriculture value
Commodity prices
Agricultural income
Bio-fuels
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Statistics: Population
Europe has 7.5% of the world population and it is about two times the USA
population; but it is much smaller than both India and China.
Population (millions) - 2005
1.400
1.200
1.000
800
600
400
200
0
China (CN)
Source: Eurostat
European
Union
(EU-25)
India (IN)
Japan (JP)
Russia
(RU)
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US (US)
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Statistics: Demographics
Population Trends
(millions)
2004
World Population
6600
EU-25 Total Population
including:
15 - 64 years old
0 -14 years old
65 and +
80 and +
457
307
75
75
18
2025
2050
9200
470
450
255
60
135
51
source: UN and Eurostat
The effect of Europe net migration will no longer outweigh the natural decrease after 2025,
when the population will start to decline gradually.
The worldwide population of the least developed areas will pass from 5,4 billion to 7,9
billion in 2050 while the developed areas will remain stabilized around 1,2 billion. They
would undergo a decline normally if one did not take in account the migration of the
developing countries towards the developed countries
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Statistics: Demographics
While the European population is substantially not growing, China, India and the USA
populations are growing around or more than 1% per year.
Evolution of EU-25 and USA population 1995-2050
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Statistics: Demographics
All European countries population evolution by age groups
Europe has grown so far
only due to the addition of
new state members (from
Europe-12 to Europe-27).
The European lack of
population growth is also
pictured here where the
main age group trends are
shown.
Source: Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) - 2007
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Statistics: Rural Population
The percentage of rural population is wide ranging and it’s decreasing everywere
Percent of Rural Population
80
70
60
%
50
40
30
20
10
0
1995 (est.)
2005
2015
2025
Year
India
China
Europe
United States of America
Source: United Nations
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Statistics: Agricultural Labor Force
Over the period 1995-2000, the agricultural labor input has declined by 2.0% p.a. in the EU15.
This rate of change has speeded up since 2000 to -2.3% for the period up to 2005 (EU25: -2.5%)
Source: Eurostat
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Statistics: Cultivated Land
Over ¾ of the territory of the European Union is agricultural (42%) or wooded land
Source: Eurostat, 2005
Source: United Nations Environment
Programme (UNEP)
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Statistics: Organic Land
The total organic area in the EU15 increased from 2.3 million hectares in 1998 to 4.9
million hectares in 2002.
The organic farming area reached 3.8% of the total Utilised Agricultural Area (UAA) of the
EU15 in 2002, up from 1.8% in 1998
Worldwide (2006): approx. 31 million of hectares are grown organically
Evolution of the total number of organic producers and size of total organic area in the EU15, 1998-2002
Source: Eurostat, 2005
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Statistics: Farm size
Total number of Agricultural Holdings (in 1000)
Source: Eurostat
Number of agricultural holdings by size, of at least
1 ESU (Economic Size Unit) in 2005
Since 1986, 2 ESU have been worth ECU 2 400, which is approximately 3 hectares
wheat-equivalent
source: Eurostat
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Statistics: Climate Change
Future impact on summer temperature (°C)
of climate change simulated within the
scenario GIEC-B2. The small red squares
correspond to a temperature increase
between 3 and 4 °C
This climate simulation model (ARPEGE-Climat) for
the years 2070-2100 is not a real forecast but it
shows what could be possible if the radiation active
gases concentration will increase according to the
model hypothesis
Source: CNRS – Centre National de la
Recherche Scientifique - France
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Statistics: Precipitations Evolution
Difference between the winter precipitations in the period 2070-2099 and the ones in
the period 1960-1989.
Figures a and b are related to two simulations of the period 2070-2099 versus the period
1960-1989, made with the model ARPEGE-Climat, different only by the initial conditions
assumptions. The scale is in mm/day. The trend on both simulations shows an increase in
winter rainfalls over Europe and a decrease over the Mediterranean see and the Northen
Africa.
The figures c and d correspond to the figures a and b and show the same trends for the
summer rainfalls.
Source: CNRS – Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - France
winter precipitations
summer precipitations
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Statistics: Climate Change
Source: UCAR – University Corporation for Atmospheric Research – ESSL Earth and Sun Systems Laboratory
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Statistics: Gross Domestic Product
GDP (billions euro) - 2005
12.000
10.000
8.000
6.000
4.000
2.000
0
China (CN)
European
Union (EU-25)
Japan (JP)
Russia (RU)
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United States
(US)
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Statistics: Agriculture value
According to the EAA the output value at producer prices (the producer prices excludes subsidies
less taxes on the products) of the agricultural industry is € 292 billion in 2005 for the EU25
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Statistics: Commodity prices
All the institutions are predicting significantly higher prices for the next 10 years
than over the past decade.
The projections are subject to many uncertainties: assumptions about productivity growth,
risks of sanitary and phyto-sanitary crises, climate change, the weather, etc.
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Statistics: Europe Agricultural Income
EU27 real agricultural income per worker rose by 5.4% in 2007, after increasing by
3.3% in 2006.
This increase was the result of a growth in real agricultural income (+3.1%) and a
reduction in agricultural labour input (-2.2%).
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Statistics: Biofuel
Current biofuel technologies
Source: IFP
The use of vegetable oils as engine fuels
may seem insignificant today but the such
oils may become, in the course of time, as
important as petroleum and the coal tar
products of the present time.”
Rudolph Diesel, 1912
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Statistics: Biofuel
EU Directives targets:
- Current: 2% of biofuel
- by 2010: 5.75% of biofuel
- by 2015: 8% of biofuel
- by 2020 10% of petrol and diesel to be replaced by biofuels (20% of energy
consumption coming from renewable sources)
 In 2005, 2.6 million hectares in Europe were occupied by energy crops used to
produce biofuels: 2.4 million hectares of crops to produce biodiesel (95% rape, 5%
sunflower) and 0.2 million hectares of crops to produce bioethanol (49% wheat, 51%
sugar beets)
 In 2005, Europe consumed about 4.2 Mt of biofuels, equivalent to 1.2% of road
transport fuel consumption. The European Union did not attain its target biofuel
content of 2% - which represents 5.8 Mtoe of biofuels.
 By 2010 the target is 16.6 Mtoe, which would require about 82 Mt of farm biomass
and a land area of about 13.8 Mha. To meet this demand for biofuel, it would be
necessary to allocate a land area for rape alone larger than the cumulated area of all
fallow land in Europe (approx. 8.2 Mha), knowing that not all of these lands are
cultivable.
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GENERAL TRENDS
From all these data we can observe, inside the change, some clearly
emerging trends:
 Agricultural workforce decrease / average age increase
 Farm size increase
 more complex farm management
 Regulations evolution
 safety / health protection
 environment / pollution reduction
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Productivity / precision increase
Bio-fuel / Bio-mass production increase
Water shortages
Organic cultivation expansion
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Population decrease / average age increase
 Agricultural workforce decrease (combined effect of European population slight
reduction and decreasing agricultural percentage of the population).
 Average age of people working in agricultural areas is increasing and this drives a
strong request for equipment ergonomic, ease of use, low-effort controls, highly
automatic operation sequences, safe drive.
 Agricultural income positive trend, in conditions of workforce decrease, implies a
significant productivity increase.
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Farm size increase
 The progressive increase of farm size implies a general complexity increase in the
farm activity management (more crops, more machines, more workers).
 The enterprise risk also increases and more management skills and tools are
required (business approach, accurate accounting, cultivation and crops planning,
fleet management, maintenance programs, purchase of services, etc.).
 The farm economic development implies a continuous search for productivity and
efficiency, which means more machines and more productive machines.
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Productivity / precision increase
 The demand for higher productivity on all farm operations is constant:
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efficient machines
high speed operations
bigger machines, higher power
automatic operations
ease of use
comfort
 Precision in farm operations is also an increasing priority, because it usually
increases the efficiency in the use of machines and materials (seeds, water,
fertilizers, etc.).
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Bio-fuel / Bio-mass production increase
 The limited availability of fossil fuels and the rapidly increasing oil prices are driving a
strong interest on bio-fuels
 Both in the USA and Europe the spontaneous extension of bio-fuel crops is
supported by dedicated governments plans.
The European target to have by 2020 10% of petrol and diesel to be replaced by
bio-fuels is going in this direction and probably more specific support to the bio-fuels
crops will come.
 The fight for low cost bio-fuel will drive even more the productivity of these
cultivations and of the machines used for that, seen that the available land is limited.
 Bio-fuel will require wider fields for energy crops, and farmers will require bigger
machines, with more hp, and bigger implements.
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Water shortages
 The climate changes are difficult to forecast, but there is a general consensus among
scientists that the global warming is a real process and that significant modifications will
happen in the next decades.
 The main consequences of global warming will be a change in precipitation pattern
(probably some increase of precipitations in Northern Europe and a decrease of
precipitations in Central and Southern Europe).
 Therefore the availability of water for irrigation will change significantly, driving changes
in the mix of cultivations.
 The demand for water will also increase dramatically in the rest of world, with the
increase of irrigated land needs.
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Organic cultivation expansion
 In Europe the land cultivated organically is roughly doubling every two years, leading to a
significant business impact in the agricultural world.
 The choice of non-OGM crops, the very limited use of pesticides and herbicides and the
use of accurate cultivation methods is driving a significant use of specialised machine
work, but with needs of “clean” machines, with low emissions and high prevention of land
and crop contamination (e.g. oil drops).
 This also leads to high value agricultural production, sustained by prices higher than
average but with demand for high quality process.
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Regulations evolution
Another important trend in Europe, and in many other countries, is
the rapid evolution of regulations.
This is a direct consequence of the social and political evolution,
with increased sensitivity to population and workers health and
safety.
Air pollution and gas and particles emissions are already strictly
regulated and they will be more.
EEC legislation on agricultural machines is quite complex and
subject to significant evolution.
- machines need to comply with a long list of EU directives
- homologation is gradually replaced by self-certification
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Regulations evolution
Typical examples where regulation has a significant impact on the product design
 Health and safety
 Roll over protection (ROPS), falling objects (FOPS)
 Hazardous substances
Air purifying devices, to limit operator exposure to hazardous substances (tractors, sprayers)
 Protection of passenger
Seat belts anchorages and location and mounting of passenger seat
 Social or horizontal Directives, intended to cover the risks in the work sites.
 Exposure of workers to the risks arising from physical agents (vibration)
Compliance with these regulations is in charge of the employer but, obviously, becomes a task
for the manufacturer.
 Road transport
 Drive by noise
 Vehicle width, axle weights and signalisation
 Increased road speed, braking performance
 EMC (electromagnetic emission)
 Engine emissions
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Engines Emissions Targets
Since 2000, there has been a continuous reduction of particulate and NOx emission levels
From Tier 4 onwards exhaust after-treatment devices will be required
2006
2014
2001
2011
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Engines Emissions targets: Europe and USA
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Engines Emissions targets: Other Countries
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GENERAL TRENDS DRIVE MACHINE EVOLUTION
 All the trends we have seen so far have a powerful drive into the evolution of
agricultural machines.
 The combined effect of these drivers and the evolution of technologies will
cause rapid changes and new offering in the machines scenario.
 The main evolution directions can be summarized as follows:
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Bigger equipment / higher power
Emissionised engines / “clean” machines / use of bio-fuels
Safe work environment
Higher speed
Serviceability / maintainability improvement
Precision farming / Auto-guidance
Automation / CVT transmissions / electronics / interaction with implements
Specialized products / highly configurable products
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Bigger equipment / Higher power
 Larger fields, less manpower, demand for higher productivity will continue driving up
equipment size and power.
 Larger implements will then require more pulling and controlling power.
 The endless power up trend will continue.
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Emissionised engines / “Clean” machines / Use of bio-fuels
 The future agricultural machines will be more and
more respectful of the environment.
The engine emissions regulations, already quite
severe, will continue to follow the big push for
further reduction, even in the emerging economies
like India and China.
 The global push to save the environment and
respect the nature will drive our machines to
become always “greener” and “cleaner”.
 The use of bio-fuels and all sort of alternative fuels
will increase significantly. Users and dealers must
become familiar with the storage, handling and use
of bio-fuels.
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Safe work environment
 The agricultural machine is often seen as a working environment, where the operator
stays for many hours a day and where he does a lot of work operations.
European and North American legislations are very focused on guaranteeing safety and
healthy working conditions.
 This means not only safe equipment and low levels of noise, vibration, air pollution, but
also ease of use and comfort.
 Instructions must be clear and exhaustive
 Controls must be easily reachable and immediate to understand and use. Signals and
warnings have to cover all the significant potential risks.
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Higher speed
 Even if the European legislation is a little bit behind, the tractor’s speed desired by users
is often higher than 40 km/h.
 50 Km/h is becoming normal in many countries (recently including the USA) and 60 km/h
or more is the next step.
 Improved braking systems and axle suspensions will be more and more required for a
safe high speed drive. And the same applies to trailers and other towed machines.
 But speed is also required in many other machine operations, because it means
productivity; so it will become a constant trend for complete vehicles and for specific
operations.
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Serviceability / maintainability improvement
 The social progress, the evolution of comfort perception and quality of life and the ageing
of population will all lead a demand for better machine serviceability.
 Customers want to service their machines less times and in an easy and safe way.
 They want to access to all the relevant parts of the equipment without risk or fatigue and
easily check the need for maintenance, in this supported by clear on-board diagnosis.
 Maintenance has to be easily planned and all the service operations must be very
simplified.
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Precision farming / Auto-guidance
 The adoption of precision farming techniques is one of the most effective ways to
increase the yield and productivity of the agricultural land.
 Satellite maps, ground and crop analysis, yield history, culture optimization planning are
now possible with the help of services and equipment available in the market place.
And the use of these tools is proving to be very effective in farm operations
improvement.
 Auto-guidance systems will more and more drive with precision the machines on the
ideal paths, to minimize errors and redundancies in field operations, pulling increasingly
sophisticated large implements.
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Automation / CVT transmissions / electronics / interaction with
implements
 The demand for productivity, ease of use and field operations improvements will drive
even more the already “exploding” rate of electronic and automatic devices on
agricultural machines.
 Continuous Variable Transmissions will grow at a very high rate and electronics will
become the technology mostly spread around in our machines.
 Electronic bus technology, based on existing standards (CAN-bus, ISO-bus) and on
new ones, will transform the machines in complex integrated systems, more and more
“intelligent” and with extended capabilities to communicate each other and with
implements and attachments.
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Look at this combine…
Instrumentation
& Man-Machine
interface
Flight Recorder
Data Logger
Precision Farming
Engine, Engine Cooling, Fan, Drum/Rotor, Sieves,
Self-Leveling, Concave, Unloading, chopper
Control
Rear Camera
Laser & GPS
Auto Guidance
Climate Control
Automatic Crop Settings
Adaptive Machine Settings
Optimal speed - Cruise Control
Header Height & Float Control
Lateral Float Control
Reel position & Speed Control
4WD & Diff. Lock
Electrical Shift Transmission
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Or at this tractor driveline…
EDC Valves &
Wiring
50 K.P.H. Dump
Solenoid Conn
Rockshaft
Potentiometer
Secure Harness
to Pipework
Harness route to
EDC Valves &
Rockshaft Pot
Diff Lock Sense
50 K.P.H. Solenoid
Conn
Creeper Sensing
Switches
4WD Sensor
Fuel Tank Level
Sensor Branch
Creeper Solenoid
(If fitted)
Diff Lock
Solenoid
PTO Brake
Solenoid
PTO
Solenoid
Trans Oil Press
Sensor
4WD Solenoid
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And the driver will no more be required…
 The rapid evolution of the machine capabilities will exceed the human expertise in the
agricultural domain and the machines will act autonomously, fully robotized.
 Examples will be:
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machine to machine optimal settings - copying
coordination of machine / machine activity
fleet management (coordinating the operation between all machines on the field for time and
efficiency gain)
 Up to the full drone machine, working without any operator on board and fully capable of
self-regulating and adapting to the field work, taking instructions from remote computers
and operators.
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Specialized products / highly configurable products
 In addition to the technology evolution, the agricultural machines will also become more
specialized, to optimize their use in the various conditions and cultivations.
 This will follow a two-fold path:
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true machine specialization, with specific devices and features for a particular set of operations
high configurability of generic machines, through options and dealer installed accessories, to
adapt them to special work and conditions.
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Engineers Are Key Game Players
Mechanical and agricultural engineers are key game players in this evolving
natural, social and technological scenario.
Our best efforts should be devoted to:
- understand general change trends and anticipate farmer’s and social needs
- continue pursuing innovation, not only on technology
- identify new or specific needs of groups of people in agriculture
- identify new product functions
- develop new ways to provide functions.
Knowledge, skills and innovation attitude are needed qualities, to surf the wave
of change and shape the future of our agricultural world.
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