The latest edition of the horticulture trade fair HortiContact, which took place on 5-7 March at the Evenementenhal Gorinchem, was successful according to fair organizer Easyfaris. A total of 318 exhibitors presented to 7,812 industry professionals. During the fair, more than half of the exhibitors had already registered for the 2025 edition.
"These three days were successful as considerably more Dutch growers visited the fair. Moreover, this important target group better evaluated the fair. It's also great to see that we welcomed almost 10% of international visitors, including the ambassadors of Mexico and Chile. The atmosphere was good, people looked ahead, and there was a lot of networking at the exhibition stands and networking terraces. The atmosphere was convivial like it used to be," says Lucas van 't Hof on behalf of the HortiContact fair team.
Innovations
This year, the fair was more concerned with innovations than ever before, as was also highlighted by the organization. In addition, it is worth noting that this year, innovations were introduced earlier in the season. Further, the HortiContact Innovation Award aims to give innovations a platform. This year, Source.ag won the award with their innovative solution Source Control. This solution autonomously executes growers' irrigation strategies. A grower puts the desired irrigation outcome into the system, and Source Control ensures the automatic rollout of a strategy that optimizes the desired outcome. The second place went to Houweling Horticulture with their innovation Backie Snail Trap, and the third prize went to Sprinkler Energy with their model SE 450 W.
What's also new at HortiContact were the three pavilions on the exhibition floor: the World Horti Center Pavilion, the Starting Materials Pavilion, and the Sustainability Pavilion. At the theme pavilions, there was a lot of networking and knowledge sharing. These components will be further developed for 2025 in collaboration with the participating parties.
Visitor numbers
In 2023, the fair organization reported more than 8000 visitors, 2000 more than the previous year. In 2022, the fair once only took place in May due to coronavirus for one time. The last edition before the coronavirus, in February 2020, attracted more than 14,000 visitors.
Since the coronavirus, the future of fairs is up for discussion. Declining exhibitor and visitor numbers are often mentioned in this respect, as was the case for this year's IPM Essen. Nevertheless, HortiContact remains the meeting place for the Dutch-speaking horticulture sector, here you can meet many new people in a short time.
This year, especially Wednesday, was a busy day at HortiContact. On other days, the earlier opening times, with doors opening at 10:00 on Tuesday and Thursday, seemed to be less successful. However, the editorial team noticed that there were more growers at the fair compared to other years. This is also supported by the figures of fair organizations.
Would you like to judge yourself? Check out our photo report and fair report. The next edition of HortiContact will take place in February as usual, from February 18-20, to be precise.