Are you interested in the latest horticultural insights and want to develop your horticulture sector further? This course gives access to world leading Dutch knowledge organisations and private companies from the horticulture sector. It provides an interactive approach to strengthen your capacities and to translate the gained knowledge and skills into value for your organization and the sector as a whole. The course covers the complete horticulture value chain, including fruit, vegetable and ornamental subsectors, and both greenhouse as well as open field production. Relevant examples from the Dutch sector will be demonstrated. Field visits and excursions are part of the programme.
What will you learn?
Participants of the course will update and strengthen their knowledge, insight and skills on:
- Horticulture production, both protected and open field production;
- Post-harvest, quality and logistics processes;
- Technical, organisational, institutional and socio-economic aspects of horticulture value chains systems;
- Domestic and international market systems;
- International standards for good agricultural practices and quality issues in international trade;
- Relevant international institutional and policy developments, as well as the relevance to your own country;
- General principles of value chain analysis, management and integrated strategies for horticultural development;
- The role of multi-stakeholder processes in developing vibrant markets.
Course programme in more detail
The rapid rise of the middle class and rising per capita income in emerging economies are leading to increasing demand for healthy, safe and sustainably produced horticultural products. These developments offer new opportunities to farmers and stakeholders involved in the Horticulture sector. However, effective growth requires the transition from highly fragmented and informal market channels to a more professional horticultural sector. A modern domestic horticulture sector may in turn open up opportunities for export markets for horticulture products.
How to register:
For who is this course?
We invite technical staff, policymakers, scientists, private sector professionals and programme / project managers who want to further develop the horticultural sector in their home countries or country of work, to enrol. Participants should be proficient in English, and have at least a BSc degree or an equivalent academic qualification and five years of work experience in a related field.
To register, please visit the following link.
The Application Procedure
- Register for the course of your interest by clicking the ‘apply’ button on the webpage of this course. A registration form will open;
- Fill in the required fields of the registration form. Please note to write your date of birth without a zero (e.g. 1-5-1980 instead of 01-05-1980);
- Before you submit, check your details on the final page of the registration form;
- After submitting, you will receive a confirmation email. Make sure to directly click on the link in the email to confirm your registration. Without your confirmation, your registration cannot be processed;
- If you apply as an OKP or MSP-scholarship candidate, you will receive a registration letter for the scholarship at the beginning of the scholarship cycle.
- If you apply as a self-funded participant: we will forward your request for acceptance to the course leader. This can take some time as it depends on the coordinators' schedule (1-3 weeks);
- If you’re accepted into the course programme, we’ll send you an admission letter by e-mail;
- You receive all required travel documents from us after you are selected for the scholarship (OKP/MSP-scholarship candidates) or when we’ve received your payment (self-funded participant).
Technology Requirements Online Learning
Minimum technical and software requirements for online learning courses are:
- Stable internet connection: required to access the online learning platform and assignments (at least 3G mobile network).
- Hardware requirement: acces to a laptop, smartphone, tablet or a personal computer with webcam and microphone.