The greatest asset of any educational institution is its successful graduates. On the one hand, their careers and professional achievements are a source of pride and a great role model for current students; on the other, an important form of material support for the educational process.
A valuable gift for students of the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine who will study land-reclamation disciplines was the addition of modern irrigation-equipment demonstration stands to the teaching lab of the Department of Feed Production, Land Reclamation, and Meteorology. This came about thanks to the cooperation of the department head, Professor Hryhorii Demydas, associate professor Vitalii Kovalenko, and our own employee Valentyn Balytskyi, a 2002 graduate of what was then the Faculty of Agronomy.
Valentyn Balytskyi is the head of irrigation-technology projects in Ukraine and is directly involved in commissioning Valley irrigation systems from a leading American manufacturer. This equipment stands out from the equivalents available on the Ukrainian market for its top-tier quality and highly qualified engineering support (these systems hold a 50% share of the global market). Photographs, technical specifications, and descriptions of these irrigation systems were featured on the donated stands.
The second part of the demonstration materials is the latest sprinkler-head samples, whose sheer variety is simply striking. Agricultural producers can choose these component parts of irrigation equipment depending on their farm’s soil and climate conditions, the crops they grow, and the regional availability of water and energy resources.
Valentyn Balytskyi and Oleksandr Bilozor spoke in detail about the innovative capabilities of the equipment presented and helped with its installation. As is traditional, there were photos with the gifts in the lab and wishes from the guests for land-reclamation disciplines to take up a larger share of the curriculum. Valentyn Balytskyi noted that the market needs specialists who know the modern possibilities of irrigation. However technologically advanced agricultural production may be, without the productive moisture plants need, achieving the desired harvest amid an increasingly dry climate is impossible.
That’s precisely why the expansion of irrigation capacity began in Ukraine in 2016. As usual, agroholdings became the flagships of this rollout, although the issue is just as relevant for smaller-scale agricultural producers. The reality is that only artificial irrigation can protect the crop-growing process from a lack of natural moisture and guarantee consistently high production profitability.
The donated sprinkler-head samples are an important material resource for new hands-on work that students of various specialties will carry out: agronomy students in the «Land Reclamation» course, ecology students in «Reclamation and Phytomelioration», and landscape-gardening students in «Hydraulic Structures of Gardens and Parks».
The department’s faculty thanked the representatives of the «ASTRA» company for the samples provided and discussed prospects for future cooperation, including the possibility of fitting out a working sprinkler unit with various spray heads within the Educational and Research Laboratory’s «Demonstration Collection Field of Agricultural Crops».
The news was published on the official website of the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine:nubip.edu.ua
