Club of bologna proceedings

4. Common activity: the Agreement, why? 
In 1996, during the EIMA Fair, CONAMA 
invited representatives from the main 
European testing stations to present their 
certification activities, with the objective of 
promoting common operations among all the 
participants. 
Then, in May 1997 in Rome, the testing 
stations of Austria (BLT - Bundesanstalt für 
Landtechnik), Germany (DLG - Deutsche 
Landwirtschafts-Gesellschaft e. V.) and Italy 
signed an Agreement for the mutual 
recognition of testing activities on agricultural 
machinery. 
This was the first step towards a European 
Agreement between testing stations. 
In 1997 and 1998 there followed other 
important meetings: in Germany, in Austria 
where the Institute of Switzerland (FAT – 
Eidgenössiche Forschunganstalt für 
Agrarwirtschaft und Lantechnik) joined the 
Agreement, and last September in Italy where 
all participants were shown the testing 
facilities and experiences made to date. 
At this last-mentioned meeting the DIAS 
(Denmark) and CEMAGREF (France) also 

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joined the Agreement. 
A strong base was thus set up for important 
co-operation, and in the future we hope that 
all the major European testing stations, and 
perhaps also those of countries outside 
Europe, will join the Agreement 
The aims of the Agreement are to improve the 
certification of agricultural machinery through 
the following steps: 
•
mutual recognition of testing procedures; 
•
creation of a network of skilled 
laboratories; 
•
development of common activities. 
In order to obtain the following advantages: 
•
reduce the costs of testing procedures and 
other common activities; 
•
optimise investments in testing 
implements; 
•
offer the manufacturer the possibility of 
obtaining full international certification 
with a single test; 
•
give the farmers an effective support for 
the choice of machinery and equipment 
and an assurance of using machines 
designed to be perfectly suitable to their 
needs. 
The mutual recognition of testing procedures 
is a very important step because it allows 
manufacturers to obtain greater benefits from 
a single test that is recognised by all the other 
testing stations; therefore, with only one full 
test the manufacturer obtains the marks of all 
the testing stations participating in the 
Agreement, and is able to export his product 
to all those countries. 
The network of well-established laboratories 
provides an opportunity to expand testing 
facilities, avoiding overlapping equipment 
and optimising investments. 
The Agreement is very important for this 
purpose, giving every testing station the 
opportunity to specialise on certain types of 
machinery, and disseminating the outgoing 
information to all the other stations, thereby 
optimising the activities. 
Other important activities will be developed 
together, based on wider experiences and 
skills and the sharing of investments. 
All these points require close co-operation 
which will be developed in the coming years, 
providing the entire sector with strong support 
and helping to prepare it for the future global 
marketplace. 
The Agreement becomes even more important 
if we consider that, with regard to safety, for 
most agricultural machines and equipment the 
Machinery Directive provides for a CE
 
mark 
based on manufacturer self-certification. 
In the course of our testing activities it has not 
been uncommon to find machines already on 
the market which do not conform to the 
required safety standards, even though they 
carry the aforesaid CE mark. 
Furthermore, the CE mark only defines a 
minimum safety requirement, and does not 
say anything about performance, quality etc. 
It is therefore difficult to envisage a market 
without specialised testing stations that can 
provide farmers with all the additional 
information that is of such importance 
considering the high cost of machines and 
equipment, and manufacturers with an official 
certification of their products. 
A good example can be drawn from the 
automotive sector, where we find many 
magazines which carry out all sorts of tests 
which are highly considered by the drivers. 
Similarly, the agricultural sector needs this 
type of activity too.