Greenport greenhouse as a source of inspiration

The Greenport greenhouse in Venlo is a benchmark in greenhouse cultivation. Tomato grower, Joep Raemakers, achieves 10 percent higher productivity and a savings of 35 percent in energy costs with this semi-closed greenhouse. The nearby Health Centre, and the Mytyl School can also rack up large energy savings by using the surplus heat from the Greenport greenhouse

‘Because of this network we really are involved in energy saving’

Talking in crop specific terms about tomatoes and trusses, for example, has become passé. Now it’s all about dry matter and stomatal apertures. This change was necessary because otherwise the growers in the greenhouse Innovation network Nieuwe Energie Systemen (INES) [New Energy Systems] in North Limburg could never have learned from each other. This is because the growers in this network are not organised into crop sectors anymore, but form a mixed group representing various crop sectors together. This is one of the conditions for fruitful sharing of experiences in cultivation using new energy systems. The approach works

Possibilities for soilless cultivation in cut chrysanthemum: Effect of irrigation frequencies and spacing schedules

Three levels of irrigation frequencies, provided by root misting, combined with three plant densities and two spacing treatments were tested to evaluate the optimum conditions during the first crop stages of chrysanthemum in a soilless cultivation system (aeroponics) in an experiment conducted in autumn. The optimum misting frequency was 3¿2’ times ¿ min h-1. A higher frequency (12¿1’) had no additional effect, whereas the lowest frequency (1¿6’) had a negative effect on total shoot dry mass (TDMs). The highest plant densities (172 and 344 plants m-2) could be used until week 2 with hardly any negative effect on TDMs, and resulted in higher light interception and higher total shoot dry mass per m2. During the period between week 2 and 4 after planting, a higher density (172 compared to 86 plants m-2) had a strong negative impact on the TDMs, while a further increase to 344 plants m-2 had only a minor effect. When spacing (week 2) from 344 to 172 plants m-2, TDMs at week 4 was not negatively affected by the high starting density, though spacing from 172 to 86 plants m-2 resulted in a 13% reduced TDMs, as compared to plants grown at 86 plants m-2 continuously. It is concluded that the irrigation frequency until week 4 after planting under these light conditions, should be three times per hour. Furthermore, very high plant densities (e.g., 344 plants m-2) are feasible until week 2 with hardly any negative effects on plant growth, while spacing schemes give several possibilities for a smaller reduction of the TDMs, than that expected by the higher initial densities

Automatiseerder en onderzoekers inspireren elkaar

De glastuinbouw gebruikte tot voor kort alleen plantengroeimodellen om de gewasgroei te beschrijven. Ze waren niet goed te koppelen aan de logistieke processen op moderne bedrijven. Hier komt verandering in door het project Plant-iT. Voor het eerst werken logistieke ICT-ers en plantenfysiologen samen aan een nieuwe generatie bedrijfsoplossingen, waarin groene kennis en logistiek echt geïntegreerd worden

Workflow Management for Multiple Sclerosis Patients: IT and Organization

Patients with Multiple Sclerosis (MS) visit various healthcare providers during the course of their disease. It was suggested that IT might help to\ud orchestrate their care provision. We have applied the USE IT-tool to get insight in the relevant problems, solutions and constraints of the MS-care and the MS care providers both in the organizational and the information technological area. There is hardly a chain of healthcare, but rather, a network in which informal communication plays an important role. This informal network worked reasonably effective, but inefficient and slow. The patient himself plays a keyrole in information exchange between care-providers. Many providers were unaware of the services that other healthcare providers could give in general or did provide to a specific patient. MS patients-count is only small for most care providers. None of the interviewed patients mentioned a lack of contacts between careproviders as a problem. They thought that lack of\ud experience caused their major problems: insufficient and inadequate care. To improve care, we proposed a solution that combines a “short MS-protocol”, the\ud introduction of a central coordinator of care and a Patient Relation Management (PRM) System. This is a simple web-based application that is based on agreement by the caregivers that supports routing, tracking and tracing of a MS patient and supplies the caregivers with professional guidelines, as written down in the protocol. It is likely that we would have suggested a far more complicated ICT solution if we had only analyzed the MS-care process as such, without specific consideration of the USE IT dimensions

De smaak is raak

Een goede smaak van biologische producten kan helpen de afzet structureel te vergroten. Daarbij is niet alleen de technische smaak van belang, maar ook of het product voldoende aansluit bij de beleving van de consument. Zeker als het om de 'light users' gaa

Towards a better understanding of the e-health user: comparing USE IT and Requirements study for an Electronic Patient Record.

This paper compares a traditional requirements study with 22 interviews for the design of an electronic patient record (EPR) and a USE IT analysis with 17 interviews trying to understand the end- user of an EPR. Developing, implementing and using information technology in organizations is a complex social activity. It is often characterized by ill-defined problems or vague goals, conflicts and disruptions that result from organizational change. Successfully implementing information systems in healthcare organizations appears to be a difficult task. Information Technology is regarded as an enabler of change in healthcare organizations but (information) technology adoption decisions in healthcare are complex, because of the uncertainty of benefits and the rate of change of technology. (Job) Relevance is recognized as an important determinant for IS success but still does not find its way into a systems design process

Varkenshouderij koppelen aan glastuinbouw

Het koppelen van varkenshouderijen en glastuinbouwbedrijven levert bedrijfseconomische en maatschappelijke voordelen op. Voordelen die groot genoeg lijken om de mogelijkheden van dergelijke bedrijfsclusters serieus te verkennen. Wageningen UR, LLTB, diverse adviseurs en ondernemers uit glastuinbouw en varkenshouderij hebben de voor- en nadelen van intensieve samenwerking op een rij gezet