About Agrarzeitung

Agrarzeitung

Agrarzeitung is a German weekly trade newspaper for the agribusiness sector, published in Frankfurt am Main by the dfv Mediengruppe (Deutscher Fachverlag). Describing itself as the leading business medium for all opinion-forming actors in agribusiness, it reaches the managers of professional agricultural enterprises as well as multipliers in agricultural trade and consulting. In print and online, it delivers news, reports, market data, commentary and background from the agricultural industry, plus current information for professional farm management. Published weekly with a circulation of around 9,200 copies, it is the business newspaper of German agriculture — aimed less at farmers in the field than at the decision-makers who shape the industry.

Overview

Agrarzeitung occupies a distinct position in German agricultural media. Where farming magazines such as top agrar or the dlv titles address farmers as producers, Agrarzeitung addresses agribusiness as an industry: the feed manufacturers, traders, processors, retailers, input suppliers, consultants, bankers and policymakers whose decisions frame what happens on the farm. Its readers are the managers of professional agricultural enterprises and the multipliers in trade and advisory services — the people for whom agriculture is a business to be managed with market data, not just a craft to be practiced.

The editorial offering reflects that audience. Each weekly issue — in print and on agrarzeitung.de — carries industry news, company reports, market data and prices, commentary and background analysis, alongside management information for running agricultural enterprises professionally. The tone is that of a business newspaper: factual, data-driven, oriented toward markets and corporate strategy. Independence and high standards of editorial quality are the values the publisher claims for the title, positioning it as the trusted information source for an industry where investment decisions run into the millions and regulatory changes can reshape entire markets.

The newspaper appears weekly in German (ISSN 1869-9707 for print and online) and is distributed across Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Europe. Its circulation of around 9,200 copies is modest in absolute terms but concentrated: in the B2B logic of trade publishing, reaching the right few thousand decision-makers matters more than reaching a mass audience. Advertisers — from agricultural machinery and input manufacturers to financial and consulting services — value exactly that concentration, which places the title among the established business media of the German agricultural sector.

History

Agrarzeitung's lineage reaches back to 1946, when it was founded as the Ernährungsdienst — a post-war information service for the food and agriculture sector, established in the same year as the Deutscher Fachverlag itself. The journal documented the reconstruction of German agriculture and the food industry through the decades of the Federal Republic: the mechanization waves, the integration into the European Community's agricultural policy, the consolidation of the food trade, and the rise of agribusiness as a global industry. The 2024 volume was numbered as the seventy-ninth year of publication, confirming the 1946 founding.

The renaming from Ernährungsdienst to agrarzeitung marked a repositioning: from a food-industry information service to the business newspaper of the agricultural value chain. Under the dfv Mediengruppe, the title developed into a multimedia business-information brand, adding the online portal agrarzeitung.de, newsletters and digital services to the weekly print edition. The publisher's agricultural media unit also produces FeedMagazine/Kraftfutter — the international magazine for the feed industry published at feedmagazine.net — creating a cluster of agribusiness titles that share editorial resources and market knowledge.

Through eight decades, the newspaper has chronicled the transformation of its sector: from post-war food security to CAP surpluses, from the BSE crisis to the current debates on sustainability, animal welfare and the energy transition in agriculture. Its archive is a record of German agribusiness history — and its weekly rhythm has made it the paper of record for an industry that plans in seasons but decides in weeks.

Coverage and Content

The newspaper's content is organized around the information needs of agribusiness professionals. Industry news covers companies, mergers, investments and personnel across the agricultural value chain — from input suppliers and machinery manufacturers to traders, processors and retailers. Market data and price reporting give readers the numbers behind the news: commodity prices, market trends and analyses that inform buying and selling decisions. Commentary and background pieces interpret developments, with the editorial voice taking positions on the industry's strategic questions.

Management information for professional farm enterprises forms a second pillar: articles on business management, financing, legal and tax issues, and operational topics that help farm managers run their enterprises as businesses. Reports from the industry's events, trade fairs and conferences document the sector's professional life, while coverage of agricultural policy — EU and German — tracks the regulatory framework within which agribusiness operates.

The online portal agrarzeitung.de extends the weekly print cycle into continuous news coverage, with newsletters delivering headlines to subscribers. The combination serves the two speeds of business information: the portal for daily currency, the weekly newspaper for the curated, commented overview. Special digital formats — market overviews, company databases and background dossiers — add reference value beyond the news flow. For readers, the value proposition is completeness within the niche: everything relevant to agribusiness decision-makers, nothing that is not.

Organization and Ownership

Agrarzeitung is published by the dfv Mediengruppe — the Deutscher Fachverlag GmbH — one of Germany's major B2B publishing houses, headquartered in Frankfurt am Main. Founded in 1946, the dfv operates across trade journals, trade books, digital media, events, corporate publishing, market research and media statistics, with a presence in six countries and products distributed worldwide. Its best-known titles include the Lebensmittel Zeitung, TextilWirtschaft, HORIZONT and AHGZ — all among Germany's top ten trade journals by advertising revenue — and it holds subsidiaries and shareholdings across Germany, Austria, Italy, Poland, India and beyond.

Within the group, Agrarzeitung belongs to the agricultural, bakery and meat media unit. The editor-in-chief is Dr. Angela Werner, and the publishing director for the unit is Christian Schnücke, supported by sales, web coordination and media service teams working from the dfv's Frankfurt offices at Mainzer Landstraße 251. The sister title FeedMagazine/Kraftfutter, serving the international feed industry, is produced by the same organizational unit, allowing shared expertise across the agribusiness portfolio. The dfv's scale — its events business, market research and international subsidiaries — gives the newspaper resources and reach that a standalone agricultural title could not command, from professional event organization to cross-border market intelligence.

Digital Presence

agrarzeitung.de is the newspaper's digital platform, publishing news continuously between the weekly print issues and hosting the title's newsletters, archives and digital services. The site serves the professional audience that increasingly expects business information on demand: market data, company news and policy updates accessible from the office or on the road. Newsletters push the most important headlines to subscribers' inboxes, maintaining the title's presence in readers' daily routines.

The Inlibra platform — the digital publishing platform of C.H. Beck, Nomos and VDI Verlag — carries the newspaper's digital editions, making current and archived issues available to institutional subscribers such as companies, associations and libraries. On social media, Agrarzeitung maintains profiles distributing headlines and engaging with the agribusiness community. For a weekly business newspaper, this digital infrastructure completes the offering: the print edition for the reflective weekly overview, the portal and newsletters for daily currency, and the digital archive for research — together forming the information system of Germany's agribusiness decision-makers, week after week and harvest after harvest.