Undercover Farming Conference

4 - 6 March 2014.  Pretoria, South Africa. Undercover Farming Expo and Conference was started in March 2012 to draw exhibitors from service providers out of the intensive Horticultural industry and a Conference with Horticultural experts speaking to a vast number of delegates. In March 2013 this was repeated with equal tremendous results. More than 1 500 visitors streamed through the doors on both occasions.

Sponsors of the Undercover Farming Expo 

Niek Schelling, Agricultural Counsellor of the 

Embassy of the Netherlands in Pretoria (left) 

and Ernst Janovsky, head of Absa AgriBusiness (right) 

are pictured with the organiser, Johan Swiegers (centre) 

Photo: Lindi van Rooyen

Highlights on the two-and-a-half day conference programme, themed What drives modernisation in the industry, included topics such as:

• Farming for the Future, 
• Profit Margins to drive production efficiencies, 
• What the markets expect, 
• Growth in undercover farming under shade netting, 
•  Importance of good seedlings, 
• Equipment for measuring of substrates, 
• Change of chemical uses- the ‘softer’ approach, 
• Getting ready for export – what role cargo agents play, 
• Flower business – Finding Export Markets and Horticulture in The Netherlands.