On February 24th and 25th 2010, trade union and employee representatives met for the 2nd transnational workshop of the European Employee Network Agricultural Machinery at the Olympik Artemis Hotel in Prague.

The workshop was hosted by the Czech trade unions OS KOVO and attended by by 21 participants from Pro-Ge in Austria, ACV-CSC Metea and ABVV Metaal in Belgium, OS Kovo, IG Metall in Germany, NSZZ Solidarnosc in Poland, Metallilitto in Finland and Vasas in Hungary.

The workshop was opened by Josef Stredula, the president of OS KOVO and was chaired by Wolf Jäcklein of the EMF as the main project coordinator.

Following the project`s first workshop end of 2009 in Madrid, this transnational workshop had its thematic focus on the impact of the current financial and economic turmoil and was dedicated to the topic of “Agricultural Machinery in time of crisis and restructuring – Exchange of employee experience and strategies”.

Trade unions and employee representatives exchanged their experiences and positions on the impact of the current global crisis on agricultural machinery in Europe and actively participated in a discussion on “good work”, precarious working conditions and the situation of agency workers in their respective home countries.

Further important points discussed were the future of the project and demands for a common declaration which will be agreed upon by all project partners and published at the final conference – the Employee Forum European Agricultural Machinery 2020 - in June 2010 in Brussels.