30th place in the Innovation Top 100
Today we learned that we reached the 30th place in the Innovation Top 100 of 2018.
This is a fantastic outcome of which we are very proud and which makes us very happy! We congratulate our colleagues and also Rob van de Meulengraaf, grower of strawberry plants for which this winning innovation was conceived.
Strawberry plants on shelves: nutritious, sustainable and fully automated
An ingenious system for strawberry cultivation in trays. The trays are deposited on raised shelves and together with the use of crop carts this hugely improves efficiency and working conditions.
The yield per hectare nearly doubles by going from 350.000 plants per hectare (conventional tray field) to a minimum of 700.000 plants per hectare. Per m2 this also means a 50% reduction in the use of water, fertilisers and plant protection products.
Trays on raised shelves
Strawberry plants on shelves: they are nutritious, sustainable and fully automated. Many manual operations can now be mechanised using crop carts that hang above the trays as the plants remain in the same spot. Operations such as the cutting of runners or the placing and removing of plastic sheets and shading sheets. Operations carried out by the employees are done quickly and comfortably from the platform above the plants.
Impact
The plants turn out to be strong and healthy and there is less danger of disease. The cultivation on raised shelves can now also be combined with the propagation of runners.
The runners do not come into contact with soil at all. The harvest is fully automatic, and this extra application prolongs the effective use of the field.
