The surveys of manufacturers and dealers unveiled during the conference, reveal that despite the Covid-19 pandemic and a strong devaluation of the Ruble in March, many companies were able to maintain sales at last year's level or even increase in the first half of the year. The highest activity was observed in the segment of powerful tractors (> 150 hp), crop care equipment and components, while the segment of transportation and logistics equipment (including loaders) showed lower performance and even a decline in the first half of the year. Regarding the outlook for the year, market stakeholders are showing moderate optimism: 40% of agricultural machinery manufacturers expect sales growth at year-end, while 25% believe sales will remain at 2019 level. The surveys also show that most ag machinery dealers in Russia expect their revenues to remain the same or even grow by 10-20% year-on-year compared to 2019.
The conference also proved to be an effective platform for communication between producers and dealers of agricultural machinery. The conference participants also discussed specific problems of the dealership business in Russia, such as falling margins and investment attractiveness of this business, and also discussed how to unite the efforts of manufacturers and dealers to increase sales and, finally, customer satisfaction. «Ag machinery manufacturers and dealers should combine their forces and make sure that farmers in Russia understand that working with any of the brands present in this meeting will make them win and make them more successful. It is less and less about just selling horse power, low fuel consumption and reliability, it is more and more about the connected support to make sure that farmers at all times have good control of what it going on and how we keep them going in difficult weather conditions, help them watch their costs and have a good fleet management», - outlined Dirk Stratmann, Chairman of the VDMA Ag Machinery working group on CIS.