DLG EV

Their core work

DLG e.V. (Deutsche Landwirtschafts-Gesellschaft) is Germany's leading professional agricultural society, known internationally as the organizer of Agritechnica — the world's largest agricultural machinery exhibition — and EuroTier, giving them unmatched reach across the European farming industry. They combine product testing and certification of agricultural machinery and food products with standards development and knowledge transfer to farming practitioners across Germany and Europe. In EU research projects, they contribute as a bridge between scientific outputs and real-world agricultural adoption, bringing industry networks, testing authority, and standardization expertise that academic or technology partners typically lack. Their recent shift toward agricultural data interoperability and machine learning reflects their growing role as a facilitator of digital transformation in the farming sector.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

In Smart-AKIS (2016-2018), DLG's involvement centered on agricultural knowledge and innovation systems — the processes by which research findings travel from labs and universities to actual farmers, a topic closely aligned with their traditional mission as an agricultural knowledge broker. By ATLAS (2019-2023), the focus had shifted to hard technical infrastructure: interoperability between farm data platforms, standardization of sensor data streams, and machine learning for decision support, signaling a move from process-level knowledge transfer toward digital-layer integration. The trend is clear: DLG is repositioning from a knowledge disseminator into a standards authority and industry connector for digital and precision agriculture technologies.

DLG is moving from facilitating how research knowledge reaches farmers toward defining the technical standards that make digital farm tools interoperable — a higher-leverage position in the precision agriculture ecosystem.

How they like to work

DLG joins all recorded H2020 projects as a participant, never as coordinator, which is consistent with their role as an industry-side validator and dissemination channel rather than a research-driving institution. Despite only two projects, they have worked with 66 unique partners across 14 countries — an unusually high figure that reflects their participation in large, multi-stakeholder European consortia where broad industry representation is required. This pattern suggests they are sought out for their network reach and sectoral authority rather than for technical research leadership.

DLG has connected with 66 unique partners across 14 countries from just two projects, indicating consistent involvement in large pan-European consortia spanning research institutions, technology providers, and agricultural organizations. Their network is primarily European with a strong agricultural and AgTech focus.

What sets them apart

DLG brings something most research or technology partners cannot replicate: direct, institutionalized access to the European farming industry through their exhibitions, member networks, and testing programs that reach hundreds of thousands of agricultural professionals annually. As the organizer of Agritechnica, they are uniquely positioned to ensure that research outputs transition from proof-of-concept to industry adoption — a gap that kills many otherwise successful EU projects. For any consortium building around precision agriculture, smart farming, or agricultural digitalization, DLG provides credibility with practitioners and a dissemination channel that no university or tech company can match.

Highlights from their portfolio

• ATLAS
  Largest project by budget (EUR 392,125, 2019-2023), addressing the foundational challenge of making agricultural data systems talk to each other — a prerequisite for any large-scale precision farming deployment in Europe.
• Smart-AKIS
  DLG's first H2020 engagement, directly aligned with their core mission of connecting research to farming practice within European Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation Systems.