After the first Georgian interns were able to start their internship at German wine farms in July, AKI is working hard on expanding the program for the upcoming internship year 2021. Therefore, AKI managing director Falk Kullen and project manager Markus Roßkopf, once again traveled to the “land of wines and churches” (we reported – see on the right).

The one-week journey from September 27th to October 2nd was used to strengthen and expand the relationship with AKI’s program partners. The trip started with a meeting with the Georgian Deputy Minister for Education, Science, Culture and Sport, Tamar Kitiashvili, followed by further meetings at the Georgian Farmers’ Association, Farmer of Future, the International Education Center as well as the Georgian offices of the DAAD and Goethe Institute in Tbilisi. In addition, AKI visited two agricultural colleges to present the German-Georgian Internship Program to interested college stuff and students in detail. The internship program will be presented to further colleges and students in online presentations in the upcoming weeks before the preparatory measures for the 2021 class begin in November.

As usual for all AKI internship programs, the Georgian students start with German classes right after the first selection round of the best applicants so that around 10 to 15 well-prepared interns can start their internship in Germany in March 2021.

On the trip through “the land of wine and churches”, AKI was once again able to reassure itself of the great interest in a professional agricultural exchange from the Georgian side – starting from the governmental level to different educational institutions to young farmers – and to experience the warm hospitality including the culinary richness. In addition to the German-Georgian Internship Program, there are more project cooperations planned to support the partner country in the South Caucasus in continuously expanding and improving professional training programs for young Georgians based on the German model of the dual vocational system.

Georgia is known worldwide for more than 500 autochthonous grape varieties and is the country of origin of wine with an 8,000-year tradition of winemaking. In particular, wine and fruit farms from Southern Germany are welcome to participate in the program and to expand international understanding among nations towards the diverse Caucasus region.