Landwards - the podcast of the Institution of Agricultural Engineers

40 episodes listed below

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Agricultural engineers on careers, safety, awards and new machinery.

The gist

Landwards is the Institution of Agricultural Engineers' own podcast, hosted by Andy Newbold, editor of Landwards magazine. It moves between one-to-one career conversations, event recordings from safety conferences and awards, and a panel weighing autonomy, hydrogen and the cost of diesel alternatives after Agritechnica.

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About Landwards - the podcast of the Institution of Agricultural Engineers

Landwards is the podcast of the Institution of Agricultural Engineers, and it makes no attempt to hide that. Every recording is framed as a programme for the land-based engineering community, with the institution's name at the start and the end. Andy Newbold hosts. He also edits Landwards magazine. He is open about how the show works, admitting that guests get a plain, even boring, set of questions beforehand. The questions are only a starting point. One strand of the show is the career conversation. Jonathan Gill, a Farm Innovation Specialist for the UK Agri-Tech Centre, appears in 'Jonathan Gill - From Robotics to Farming', where the talk takes in offshore machines that needed an hour and a half to reach the ocean floor and flying machines that had to photograph one exact location. Along the way it settles on a working principle: knowing your own weaknesses makes you stronger than believing you are impregnable. David Whattoff, introduced as a former work colleague who drifted into friendship, gets a similar hearing. His conversation turns fertiliser spreading, right down to a wind-control unit that adjusts the spread pattern, into an argument that decisions are about value and not only money. Events supply the other strand. 'IAgrE Awards 2025 - Part One' and 'IAgrE Awards 2025 - Part Two' gather interviews with winners from the institution's awards, held in April at AGCO's Abbey Park headquarters in Warwickshire. Former Harper Adams student David Goodchild is among them. Howell Jones, whose final project Trailed Implement Efficiency Monitor won the Student Safety Award 2024, admits he never expected his coursework to go this far. Martin Parsons and Jo Thiller talk about bringing lowland peat restoration to a new audience, and a Meritorious Award winner is thanked for two decades of service. Part One closes on the idea that agricultural engineering is an attractive career choice. Safety gets a hearing of its own. 'Growing Safely - The IOSH Rural Industries Conference, November 2025' was recorded at the event, with IOSH president Richard Bate just off the stage after his keynote and Mike Whiting of NEWMAC Limited, chair of the IOSH Rural Industries Group. One speaker describes a family farm that diversified long ago and worries that much high-risk rural work goes on behind closed doors. Then there is the machinery show. 'LandTechnik AgEng2025 and Agritechnica - Now the Dust has Settled' brings five industry colleagues together, a little overdue by the host's own admission, to discuss autonomy, hybrid transmissions, battery electric and hydrogen, and how expensive diesel alternatives still are. What a listener gets is the profession talking to itself, warmly and plainly, with a host who makes no secret of enjoying his guests.

Made for: Suits a listener who works in or near agricultural engineering, farm machinery or rural safety and likes hearing peers talk through their careers, their award-winning projects and their views on new machinery.

What sets it apart: Instead of product news, it gives the view from inside a professional institution. Students, safety practitioners and working engineers get the floor, and personal career stories sit alongside awards interviews and a panel verdict on Agritechnica.

In their own words

Topical and current information, interviews and discussion for members professional journeys through the lens of agricultural engineering.

Why you'd press play

A runaway drone carries Mum's camera six miles; you get the dodgy connection, too.

Press play if you want

  • to hear Andy Newbold ask practical questions about electric drives and familiar transmissions
  • to follow a farmer who treats "we want to farm" as a design brief
Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →
agricultural engineering careersautonomy and robotics in farmingalternative fuels, hybrid drives and hydrogenfarm and rural safetyIAgrE awards and student projectstrade shows such as Agritechnica

Talks about

Best episodes of Landwards - the podcast of the Institution of Agricultural Engineers

Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.

LandTechnik AgEng2025 and Agritechnica - Now the Dust has SettledDec 12, 2025

A candid Agritechnica panel tests electric farm machinery ambition against cost, performance and field reality.

Landwards uses Agritechnica as a wide-ranging roundtable on where farm machinery may be heading, with Andy Newbold, Charlie Nicklins, Chris Smith and Harry Henderson weighing autonomy, diesel alternatives and the economics of new equipment.

Growing Safely - The IOSH Rural Industries Conference, November 2025Nov 28, 2025

A grounded rural safety review of changing countryside work and the persistent human risks around it.

Landwards uses a rural industries safety conference to frame a practical look at how countryside work keeps shifting while familiar risks remain.

Jonathan Gill - From Robotics to FarmingSep 10, 2025

Jonathan Gill turns a lost drone and Hands Free Hector into a clear case for practical, failure-led farm innovation.

Jonathan Gill's route into farm innovation is grounded in machines that had to prove themselves in awkward places: an offshore system built for the ocean floor, and an OctoRotor drone expected to photograph a precise spot before coming home.

David Whattoff - The Power of Curiosity (or Turn Over a Few Stones).Jun 26, 2025

David Wattoff shows how curiosity and farm experience can grow into a career in precision agriculture.

David Wattoff's path from a 400-500-acre family farm background into precision farming gives this Landwards episode a grounded way into agricultural technology.

IAgrE Awards 2025 - Part OneMay 22, 2025

Award-winning student projects connect neatly with the working realities of agricultural engineering.

Landwards uses an Institution of Agricultural Engineers awards ceremony to bring agricultural engineering careers down to human scale. David Goodchild talks about his BNG dissertation, Developing a Standard Tineware Evaluation Methodology, with the satisfaction of seeing study,…

Podcasts like Landwards - the podcast of the Institution of Agricultural Engineers

Episodes

  1. 1

    LandTechnik AgEng2025 and Agritechnica - Now the Dust has Settled

    Hidden gem

    Andy Newbold gathers Charlie Nicklins, Chris Smith, Harry Henderson, Kieran Walsh, and Clive Blacker for a Landwards roundtable on Agritechnica and the Land Technic conference.

    Dec 12, 2025·59m·5 clips
  2. 2

    Growing Safely - The IOSH Rural Industries Conference, November 2025

    Hidden gem

    Landwards' "Growing Safely" episode centers on IOSH's Rural Industries Conference at Warwick University in Coventry, with Richard Bate, Sam Downey, and Mike Whiting reflecting on rural safety and mental health.

    Nov 28, 2025·23m·1 clip
  3. 3

    Wood, Water & Innovation: Building Resilience in Rural Environments - The Forestry Engineering Group Symposium 2025

    Oct 24, 2025·34m
  4. 4

    Jonathan Gill - From Robotics to Farming

    Hidden gem

    ["Landwards, the Institution of Agricultural Engineers podcast, follows Andy Newbold speaking with Jonathan Gill about robotics, drones, and farm innovation.", "Gill says he was a child who took things apart, built radio-controlled planes with his father, and soldered a new radio-controlled car from broken parts at primary school.", "He recalls teachers calling him 'a bit thick,' then credits a Plymouth University foundation year, dyslexia support, and a marine sports technology route with turning physics and maths into usable tools.", "Gill describes six and a half years offshore with Oceaneering International, a drone flyaway from Shropshire into Herefordshire, and a later move into Harper Adams work, Project Vista, and human-in-the-loop farming AI."]

    Sep 10, 2025·47m·3 clips
  5. 5

    Dr Tim Chamen - Innovations in Soil Management

    Jul 30, 2025·58m
  6. 6

    David Whattoff - The Power of Curiosity (or Turn Over a Few Stones).

    Hidden gem

    Andy Newbold hosts Landwards for the Institution of Agricultural Engineers and talks with David Wattoff, Country Manager of Meetos UK, about a career that moved from a family farm into precision agriculture.

    Jun 26, 2025·25m·2 clips
  7. 7

    IAgrE Awards 2025 - Part Two

    May 30, 2025·13m
  8. 8

    IAgrE Awards 2025 - Part One

    Landwards presents interviews with winners of the Institution of Agricultural Engineers awards ceremony held in April at AGCO's Abbey Park headquarters in Warwickshire.

    May 22, 2025·19m·1 clip
  9. 9

    Andrew Court - Outstanding in the field

    Hidden gem

    Andy Newbould interviews Staffordshire farmer and agricultural engineer Andrew Court about building a farm from scratch during the 2020 lockdown.

    Mar 5, 2025·35m·2 clips
  10. 10

    Professor Dick Godwin - A reflection on an agricultural engineering life

    Feb 10, 2025·48m
  11. 11

    Lamma 25 - ideas, inspiration and innovation, the problem solving edition

    Hidden gem

    Landwards from the Institution of Agricultural Engineers reports from LAMMA 25, where Charlie Nicklin presents an Innovation Award and discusses agricultural engineering under market and political pressure.

    Jan 17, 2025·26m·1 clip
  12. 12

    Eric Hansotia - put your head down and deliver solutions

    Aug 19, 2024·24m
  13. 13

    Esther Kimani - Using technology to break down barriers.

    Jul 16, 2024·30m
  14. 14

    Dr Mark Moore - Meet the President, and a late starter

    May 9, 2024·45m
  15. 15

    Robotics Specialist Interest Group takeover

    Mar 4, 2024·52m
  16. 16

    Agritechnica preview

    Discussion of trends in agricultural engineering and machinery, inspired by Agritechnica press releases.

    Oct 30, 2023·42m
  17. 17

    Dr Mark Cooper - a reflection on practicalities and purpose

    Sep 7, 2023·38m
  18. 18

    IAgrE News August 23 - Big tractors and bog farming

    Aug 11, 2023·37m
  19. 19

    Maisie Wildgoose - heading into ag tech

    Feb 10, 2023·32m
  20. 20

    Steve Constable - Meet the president

    Jun 29, 2022·21m
  21. 21

    Joe Martlew - designing farming systems that work, being a late starter and part of a weird network

    May 2, 2022·22m
  22. 22

    Graham Higginson - Routes into agricultural engineering - and what's for tea?

    Apr 5, 2022·35m
  23. 23

    Clive Blacker - He's an engineer, but in denial.

    Aug 24, 2021·27m
  24. 24

    William Tuer - A practical basis for an engineering life

    Jul 26, 2021·38m
  25. 25

    Harry Henderson - Engineering, farming, his ploughing secret and being a good listener

    Jun 27, 2021·40m
  26. 26

    Kit Franklin - 'Why I decided to change agriculture'

    Feb 26, 2021·27m
  27. 27

    IAgrE News 24th February 2021 - Events, jobs, and (belated) predictions for an unpredictable year

    Feb 24, 2021·30m
  28. 28

    Hugh Crabtree - Data, pigs and precision livestock

    Feb 18, 2021·33m
  29. 29

    Clare Butler Ellis - How agricultural engineering chose me and is it a discipline?

    Jan 29, 2021·24m
  30. 30

    IAgrE November news update - Big data, self watering soils and digital events

    Nov 27, 2020·20m
  31. 31

    Meet Charlie Nicklin - an interview with the new CEO of the Institution of Agricultural Engineers

    Oct 12, 2020·17m
  32. 32

    A conversation with Jane Rickson - from physical geography, via soils to professor.

    An interview with Professor Jane Rickson about her background in geography and her work on soil erosion and conservation.

    Jul 21, 2020·27m
  33. 33

    IAgrE July news update - Vertical farming, hydrogen power and regional education

    Jul 15, 2020·10m
  34. 34

    The Society for the Environment and professional registration

    Jul 1, 2020·22m
  35. 35

    IAgrE June news update - Events, encouragement and food scarcity

    Jun 25, 2020·14m
  36. 36

    An interview with Philip Wright - Soils, metal and machine design

    An interview with an independent advisor on soils and cultivations about his career in agricultural engineering.

    Jun 15, 2020·39m
  37. 37

    Landwards monthly news May 2020

    May 28, 2020·15m
  38. 38

    Meet the new President - an interview with Paul Hemingway

    An interview with the new president of the Institution of Agricultural Engineers discussing his background and the field of agricultural engineering.

    May 21, 2020·34m
  39. 39

    The benefits of professional registration

    Apr 30, 2020·21m
  40. 40

    Continuing Professional Development - CPD

    Mar 26, 2020·9m