History of the Festival
Chapters from the History of the Festival
The idea to organize an international film festival dealing with agro-food problems arose as early as 1981. With more and more films from the sphere of agriculture, nutrition of inhabitants and food industries registered to the festival Technofilm in Pardubice and Ekofilm in Ostrava, the organizers of these festivals proposed in Krátký film Praha to organize an independent festival under the title Agrofilm. The town Nitra was chosen as the venue due to its character of an emerging center of agricultural science, specialized education and exhibition. The only suitable facility, as far as rooms and technical equipment are concerned, was found in the Research Institute for Animal Production, which was then considered only a temporary solution. The Institute created conditions and developed such activities for successful course of Agrofilm that it became its permanent organizer.
The objective and mission of this special festival is to inform, incite and disseminate knowledge of science, research, development and practice in the sphere of agriculture, food industry, nutrition of population, forestry, water management, ecology, problems in rural areas and of their inhabitants, conservation and revitalization of natural resources, which provide food sufficiency and safety as well as healthy environment, cultural landscape and improvement of human life. Agrofilm gradually worked its way up to an event, which is rare in the world with this focus of activity.
Accompanying events – international specialist symposia focused on problems preferred in the given year and exhibitions of creations of prominent Slovak artists – became a part of the festival and they present our culture to broad, also foreign, public taking part in Agrofilm under the title “Rendezvous of Science and Art”.
The Research Institute for Animal Production, today one of the institutes within the National Agricultural and Food Centre NPPC, has organized the festival already for three decades. The festival is organized under the auspices of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development of the Slovak Republic. Alongside the town of Nitra and the Self-governing Region of Nitra, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has also joined the ranks of the regular partners of the festival. For many years, EMERING FILM PRAHA cooperated with the festival.
More than 4,000 films were presented at the festival over the past three decades. The film library comprises almost one thousand winning films, which the producers granted to the organizers.
Thematic structure of the festival changes in the course of time. In addition to the still frequented problems of undernourishment, hunger and food sufficiency for all regions and spheres of inhabitants, the festival highlights also the importance of safety and quality of foodstuffs, non-commercial functions of agriculture – as creation and protection of nature and environment, sustainability of rural settlement and life quality of the inhabitants, landscaping aspects, decrease in consumption of non-renewable energy resources in production processes, utilization of biomass, etc.
