A farmer in the Netherlands has developed a sustainable business model based making efficient use of natural resources while growing crops.
Ekoto is an organic farm in the south of the Netherlands. On 7ha of land, the farm grows arable crops, including over 30 different types of vegetables and herbs in strip cropping.
The farm was set up by a young farmer, Ivar van Dorst, in 2020. His motivation was to provide local, organic alternatives to the everyday products, such as tea and beans.
The aim of the farm, van Dorst explained, is to “accelerate the transition to a sustainable and transparent supply chain”.
van Dorst grew up on the family farm, and, as while parents had already left farming, he was well aware of the challenges linked to the profession.
The Dutch farmer said: “I had in mind from the start that I needed to make a living out of the farm, otherwise it would not be sustainable.
“I also needed to find ways to ensure the farm could cope with external variables, such as the changing climate.”
In his first year, in 2020, van Dorst decided to focus on which crops grow best next to each other.
Each year since, he has added other elements; for example, exploring what works financially and how to maintain employment on the farm.
As part of his business model, van Dorst innovates with sales based on customer demand.
He supplies local businesses with products such as vegetable box schemes, providing zero-waste shops, cafés and bakeries with a variety of produce, and he also has a shop and a ‘pick your-own’ service.
System of crops on the farm
The strip-cropping at Ekoto is made up of a rotation of five crops: a cereal crop (mainly oats), a fruit crop (pumpkin), a legume crop to fix nitrogen, several vegetables, and an ‘experimental crop’ as the fifth.
van Dorst and his team apply strip cropping on most of the fields. They test combinations of crops to determine which can be most effective.
For the strips which are 6m wide, to accommodate the 3m-wide machinery, GPS is used to make sure they are in the same place every year.
The strip crop method increases biodiversity, and makes it more difficult for pests and diseases to spread.
This means lower inputs are needed, and creates a healthier environment for the people working on the farm and better products for the consumer.
The fields also have flowering borders, which attract beneficial insects and serve as a buffer against invading snails and slugs.
van Dorst has been experimenting with different varieties of beans, and the combination of the bean crop with yarrow and camomile for tea has proven very successful.
Even though broad beans suffer greatly from aphids, the nearby herbs and flowers attract ladybirds that feast on the aphids and naturally limit the damage to the bean crop.
“Since we moved the herbal strips close to the beans, we have certainly seen an increase in natural enemies and a reduction in crop damage to the beans due to pests,” he said.
As some companies have shown a particular interest in certain ancient bean varieties, the farm is now running a research project with local funding to experiment further with beans as an effective crop for strip-cropping.
They obtained 50 different ancient bean varieties from a seed bank, and are now conducting field trials.
van Dorst and his team would like to take this innovative business model based on strip-cropping further.
“I would really love to continue scaling up the cultivation of beans in Europe, tackling the distribution and business-model side, and promoting beans as a viable crop for
European farmers,” he said.