Young Fleming Yorick Peers proves that ornamental horticulture is not a dying sector in Flanders. He converted a tomato nursery of 2.7 ha and has been growing green house plants in small pot sizes at his company Greenosa since last fall. He focuses on the retail and arrangement markets. “For retail, you need to be able to guarantee volumes.”
The number of ornamentals growers in Flanders has been in decline for years. Older growers can hardly find successors, quitting as they approach pension age. Experts predict that this will lead to even more empty older, smaller greenhouses. Peers (27) is proof that there is indeed room for a younger generation. Last year, he started his nursery, Greenosa, at the site of a former 2.7 ha tomato farm in Duffel, a village between Antwerp and Brussels. With seven years of experience at an ornamentals company under his belt, he is not a complete newcomer to the sector.
