The overall winner was Reddish Vale High School , Stockport , whose students enjoyed getting involved in faming-related activities , from tractor and digger driving to stock handling and learning about soil and grass management , genetics and animal nutrition .

The other finalists were Ripley St Thomas C of E Academy , Lancaster ; St Christopher ' s Church of England High School , Accrington ; Priestlands School , Pennington , Lymington , Hampshire , and The Queen Elizabeth Academy , Atherstone .

The weekend concluded with each school delivering a

presentation on why ' Farming is so much more than mud and wellies ?' to a panel of judges made up of representatives from Coleg Llysfasi and LEAF Education .

Iain Clarke , Head of Llysfasi - part of Coleg Cambria - congratulated the pupils and teachers for their enthusiasm and creativity .

" It is absolutely incredible how these school groups took in so much information over the weekend ," said Mr Clarke .

" Offering this hands-on experience is so valuable for education , linking food to farming and the environment and showing the many exciting career options in the agricultural sector .

" For many years we have worked with schools to showcase what farming has to offer , and this new partnership with LEAF Education was a great way to engage and build those relationships ."

He added : " We hope the competition and the prize weekend in particular has equipped these

young people with a great appreciation of what farmers do and where their food comes from .

" We look forward to building on this year ' s success and would like to thank everyone who took part ."

The winning team from Reddish Vale High School - Alex Jamieson , Megan Millington and Coby Stringer - revealed they had an " absolutely wonderful " weekend in North Wales .

LEAF ' s Regional Education Consultant Katy Pallace added : " It was inspiring to see how the young people responded to the opportununity to immerse themselves in livestock genetics , nutrition , precision technology , woodland management and much more , and also think about the big challenges of feeding a growing

population . " It was clear how much they enjoyed being around the animals , learning from the college staff and having fun ."

The competition follows the record-breaking LEAF Open Farm Sunday in June , where up to 300,000 visitors flocked to farms across the UK , including 500 who attended the day of education at Llysfasi , forging even closer links with youngsters across the region .

For more information and to register an interest in next year ' s Innovation School of the Year in Food , Farming and Environment competition , visit www . cambria . ac . uk or call 0300 303 0007 .

AG , a Chinese company which was founded in 2007 , focuses on agricultural automation and research and development of unmanned devices . XAG is one of the world ’ s largest agricultural drone manufactures with a largescale manufacturing and operational centre in China .

Over a period of 12 months XAG crop-spraying drones have flown 1.7 million times in total , served more than 700,000 Chinese farmers covering two million hectares of land .

Justin Gong , Co-Founder and Vice President of XAG , said : “ As the strategic partnership has been

officially established , I am sincerely looking forward to the collaborations between XAG and Harper Adams University to develop localised done and robotic solutions which suit the UK and European farmers .

“ We hope our technology can equally serve UK and European farmers , to help them improve productivity using sensors mounted on the drones to monitor the condition of the crop and subsequently only applying the chemical precisely on area requiring treatment .

“ In addition , we would like to devote more on researching about AI technologies and ground-based robots to free farmers ’ hands , also to accelerate the popularisation of

drone application . With HAU ’ s research strengths on agriculture and sustainable farming , I believe we can make the most of our potentials .”

Parmjit Chima , Head of Engineering at Harper Adams , said : “ It ’ s great to see the university being recognised as a leader in agricultural drone and robotics technology by XAG in this mutually beneficial collaboration to develop new agri-tech solutions for farmers both at a national and international level ."

Harper Adams Research Support and Project Lead , Debbie Heeks said : “ At present , UK legislation does not permit the use of drones for crop spraying . However , Harper is working closely with the relevant

authorities , such as CAA and others to enable trials involving drones for the first time in the country .

“ At the recent Agricultural Innovation Conference and Exhibition , XAG donated a high specification agricultural spraying drone to Harper . The P20 2018 Plant Protection UAS , named Barbara , is a fully autonomous system . It was presented to us by Justin Gong , Bridge Liu and Walter Chen .

“ It ’ s a very clever system and it ’ s very exciting that we have the opportunity to work with it and XAG . We hope that our work with the system will help strengthen the case for using crop spraying drones in the UK .”