
High hopes of improving quality and yield while reducing costs
Father and daughter team Lucian and Laura Ene run the biggest and most high-tech gerbera cultivation facility in Romania. The last expansion, in 2019, ...

‘Everything is focused on delivering the right quality for our customers’
Everything Agrokultura Group does is focused on improving the quality of its fresh produce. It combines its agronomic expertise with advanced greenhouse technology and ...

‘High-tech greenhouses the direction for Chinese horticulture’
As part of a joint venture with Haofeng Food Group, in 2018 the Chinese state-owned building materials company China National Building Material (CNBM) set ...

In Greenhouses May issue free for all to read online
The Coronavirus is causing difficult and tense times for the greenhouse horticulture industry. At In Greenhouses we are making every effort to publish the ...

‘This greenhouse has everything a grower could dream of’
Little Leaf Farms is a semi-closed high-tech greenhouse facility in Devens, Massachusetts, USA. Horticultural entrepreneur Paul Sellew was keen to offer consumers in New ...

Austrian grower: ‘Flavour is our most important asset and we treasure that’
Quality, quality and more quality. That is key at Frutura Thermal-Gemüsewelt, an Austrian company that produces its vegetables exclusively for the Spar supermarkets. Although ...

The cousins Jos and Bram Moerman: ‘We keep the nursery in the family’
Many greenhouse operations are family businesses, and it can often be difficult to persuade the next generation to take the company on. At Sunnyside ...

‘Hybrid lighting guarantees high-quality tomatoes all year round’
A more generative plant, 10 to 12 % more production, and Brix measurements at summer levels all year round are the key results of ...

Ultra-thin glass: the way forward for the low-energy greenhouse?
Glass just 0.55 mm thick has been around for some time now. It’s on every mobile phone and tablet. It’s extremely light, strong and ...

Reducing water usage in Saudi Arabian horticulture
There are major changes afoot in Saudi Arabia. One key strategy is to convert the country from an economy that is dependent on oil ...

“We fine-tune the amount of water to the plant’s energy supply”
In Next Generation Growing, everything revolves around the needs of the plant. In the past, much of the way growers controlled the climate was ...

New predatory bug limits establishment of Nesi in tomato
Researchers have found three species of predatory bug in the Miridae family that can limit the establishment of the harmful predatory bug Nesidiocoris tenuis ...

‘We aim to grow the best basil in Europe’
Christ en Jacqueline Monden of De Kruidenaer in Etten-Leur had hybrid lighting installed in their new high-tech greenhouse, in which they grow basil, just ...

Fixed irrigation cycles are out, the plant itself tell us
Higher lighting capacity, new diffuse glass types and intensive screening are developments that are having a major impact on irrigation strategies. Plants themselves can ...

Research sheds new light on raspberries and blackberries
Raspberries and blackberries are relatively new crops under glass, so knowledge in this area is as yet in very short supply. Woody small fruit ...

“Combination of breeding and production is key to success”
Despite having gained a growing reputation in the world of plant breeding over the years, cultivation of pot and bedding plants is still German ...

Rhizoctonia
Rhizoctonia solani is a soil fungus with a wide host range and worldwide distribution. Host plants include almost all vegetables, flowers, shrubs and trees ...

LED light catching on in fruiting vegetable propagation
Grow light has been widely used for propagating vegetable plants for many years. The tried-and-trusted fluorescent lights in climate cells and SON-T lights in ...

Tulip forcers can reduce transpiration without affecting quality
Stem topple is a serious problem in the flower bulb sector. Bent stems are unsaleable and are therefore something to avoid if at all ...

“We’re aiming for 5% higher yields with more and bigger fruits”
The roofs of many new greenhouses now contain glass with an anti-reflection (AR) coating, which improves light incidence. For a long time there was ...

When each leaf counts, leaf samples can point to plant’s needs
It’s fine for a tomato plant to have a few spots on its leaves. But it’s a different matter when it comes to flowering ...

One drainage slit per plant distributes nutrients more evenly
At the Greenway tomato nursery in De Lier, the Netherlands, each slab doesn’t have just one slit but two: one for each plant. A ...

A new California
For years we would always tell our surprised guests that no, in fact, we don’t need artificial cooling to grow Phalaenopsis. “But doesn’t it ...

Dutch growers grow pink tomatoes in Azerbaijan for Russian market
John and Jolanda van der Lee have swapped the Netherlands for Azerbaijan to run an 11 hectare tomato nursery there. Before they left, they ...

“Knowledge of soil organisms is key in ideal potting mixture”
Bark, the main ingredient of orchid substrates, is steamed at high temperatures. This kills off all the impurities and pathogens. But unfortunately it also ...

Strap stacked pallets securely for stable transportation
At the end of the harvesting, sorting and packing process, the boxes or crates of products are stacked on pallets. It is important to ...

Multiple sensors and app shed more light on slab root environment
Snack tomato nursery Vitensa of Vierpolders, the Netherlands, uses a monitoring system with multiple wireless slab sensors in two of its greenhouse sections in ...

Chrysanthemum growers finally get thrips control back on track
Dutch chrysanthemum growers are feeling quite optimistic about thrips control. After years of high pest pressure, growers are getting more adept at integrated pest ...

Emission-free growing on unbuffered coco with good results
A consortium of companies is trialling and demonstrating a concept for emission-free growing at the Water Innovation and Demonstration Centre in Bleiswijk, the Netherlands ...

I’ve seen the sun rise over Africa
There’s a Dutch song that starts with those words. When I’m at home in South Africa I see the sun literally rising over the ...