Members
have their say

Fleur: "During the first year and a half of our business, Little Spider really took off. We got more requests than we could handle. Now this flow has levelled off a bit. The Sustainability Award came just at the right time: it gives our name another boost. Moreover, we get to work with marketing agency Druktemaker on our brand awareness, which comes as part of the prize. For us, this is most welcome. We do not do acquisition. We do not approach growers to buy our product. When growers get started with Little Spider, they themselves must have confidence that it will work. After all, it takes a while before you really see any effect. You need to build a healthy population of spiders first. Little Spider is therefore not a quick fix for an infestation, but an investment in a healthy greenhouse system in the long term. Then, as a grower yourself, you must already be convinced that this suits your beliefs and way of working.

For me, it is important to stay true to ourselves in everything we say and do. Our intention is not to sell on a large scale. We genuinely want to help growers. If another way suits them better, that's also fine. In the coming period, we will continue to work on putting our company on an even firmer footing.  But we are also innovating. Currently what we are supplying to customers are spider nests. This is because spiders are cannibalistic.

Ermiyas: "Our idea is always: do what we do as well as possible. We will therefore use the coming period to further improve the reuse of cutting waste at the farm and further streamline our processes. For the most part, this has already worked out very well. I am no longer the only one who understands how it works. Our team can also do it, and even if I am not there for some reason, the process carries on. I'm proud of that.

But I am also always looking one step ahead. For example, we are now researching biochar (organic charcoal). This is a charcoal-like substance that you can use as a soil conditioner, a fertiliser and to purify water.

‍

We are now researching how to produce this ourselves through the oxygen-free burning of green waste, using used motor oil as fuel. This way we kill two birds with one stone: the motor oil gets another use, and we ourselves produce a substance that is good for our roses. I also want to further digitise water management. We already have figures on quantity and quality, but there is room for improvement. In the coming years, we will modernise and digitise our wastewater management system to make monitoring even more efficient and accurate

I am honoured that we were awarded the second prize of the Sustainability Award. It gives us the opportunity to talk about what we do and how we do it, as well as show other growers that step-by-step sustainability is really very possible.

‍

Sharing our experiences is always at the heart of Ziway Roses' strategy. We believe in learning from each other. Our door is always open - to fellow growers, government agencies or anyone interested. Sharing experiences helps us all move forward and helps us discover best practices. We work hard to be as sustainable as possible - for our employees, our community and the planet. We also need to keep talking about these efforts over and over again, because sustainability is a journey that never ends."

‍

Frank: "SPRAYVENTIVE combines inventive technology with the ability to prevent pests and fungus. The name itself comes from a combination of the words 'spray', 'preventive' and 'inventive'. We launched a brand and patented our process. Yet we had no immediate intention of marketing SPRAYVENTIVE. However, we soon got in touch with growers who were interested in our process and curious to see how it would work for their plants."

Alex: "The interest from others is certainly there, but there are also growers with healthy dose of trepidation. We will therefore spend the coming period on further developing our machine so that we have an even better grasp of what we are doing. Good colleagues and close growers help us with this. Each plant has its own characteristics, so we are currently testing what effect UVC light has on different plants. How long should the plants be exposed to it and how often? What is the lower limit and what is the upper limit? And what happens when combined with other biological stimulants? The best thing is if at some point we discover the ideal amount of UVC light needed for each crop."

‍

Frank: "The Sustainability Award also involves collaboration with a marketing agency. For us, it's clear: we don't need a big marketing campaign right now. It's too early for us to attempt something like that. However, they can help us with a communication strategy for SPRAYVENTIVE so that we have a better idea better of what to say and how to do it. This is how we reach growers interested in our machine. But at the end of the day, it is product that has to prove itself."

Alex: "I think with SPRAYVENTIVE we can make a good contribution to making floriculture more sustainable. With this, we can demonstrate how we barely have to use any plant protection products, and, for what products we do use, how we spray these very specifically and preferably using organic products."