Young agronomists from EkoNiva’s enterprises situated in the Black Soil, Siberian and Volga regions have undergone a three-day traineeship on the company’s premises in Ryazan oblast.

According to Yevgeniy Bezpalov, EkoNiva’s Chief HR Manager, the corporate traineeship programme aids in accomplishing several objectives: first of all, introducing new specialists to the latest crop farming technologies; secondly, expanding the horizons of trainees through employing the entire range of corporate resources; and finally, forming a close-knit team of professionals and encouraging them to exchange their experience and to thrive within the holding.

The traineeship programme is divided into three stages, the first of which took place at Ryazan-based operations where the participants of the crash course scrutinised grain, soya beans, sunflower and flax cultivation methods. Additionally, the trainees were also introduced to the modern planting and tilling machinery.

‘I got familiar with EkoNiva this spring when I took part in its corporate Academy of Agronomy. Since the very beginning, our mentors generously shared their professional knowledge with us, held lectures and arranged excursions’, says Sergey Khomutov, an agronomist at Sibirskaya Niva. ‘By the time I graduated from the university, I was offered a traineeship followed by a job offer. The crash course was very informative, it was the first time I got a chance to study peculiarities of plant farming outside my home region. We have two more trips ahead of us which promise to be no less interesting.’

In September and October, when the next stages of the crash course are to be held, the young specialists will dive into the no-till approach and techniques used in cultivating alfalfa, sugar beet, rapeseed, lentils. They will also get to know the fundamentals of plant growing economics, precision farming technologies and Eko.Crop, an in-house application devised for agronomists.