News » 12.10.2026 - Lumiforte grows within and beyond horticulture
Growers know ReduFuse and ReduHeat, but Selectline? Most growers are not familiar with the product. Members of Horticoop, the Dutch investment cooperative for growers, now are. About 25 members took part in a "Deep Dive" session at Lumiforte, one of the companies Horticoop invests in, at the company's site in Baarle-Nassau in the Netherlands.
The theme of the session was zero-emission cultivation. Jim van Ruijven of Wageningen University & Research (WUR) and Jerry van Leent of Yeald gave presentations, followed by presentations and an extensive tour from Lumiforte.
Horticoop has been active as an investment cooperative for almost five years. To involve members in its investment strategy, it uses Deep Dive sessions to stay in close contact with them. Which topics matter to current and former growers, and which companies could be interesting to invest in? Growers are well placed to judge this from their own cultivation practice.
Tour with a behind-the-scenes look at Lumiforte by Paul van Gils.
Growth within and outside horticulture
Lumiforte is one of Horticoop's portfolio companies. In 2024, it was sold to investment firm Kartesia, and Horticoop has held a minority stake since then. The sale to the international investor allowed Lumiforte to expand its product range and grow further in the market. As a shareholder with a substantial minority stake, Horticoop benefits from this as well.
Attendees heard how Lumiforte is growing, including outside horticulture. Around 30% of revenue now comes from sports field marking, where Selectline is a well-known brand. Following acquisitions in Germany and Belgium in 2025 and 2026, Lumiforte is a top-three player in European sports field marking. The company now also wants to enter the North American market.
Meanwhile, a team of 11 lab technicians is developing new products, such as Cropshader, and improving existing ones. A key goal is to develop bio-based coatings with as many natural ingredients as possible. In traditional horticulture, Lumiforte sees growth potential in the plastic-film greenhouse market, where coatings can be used to clean the film.
Dilemmas
Before Lumiforte took the floor, Jim spoke on behalf of WUR about zero-emission cultivation. The sector is working hard on this through projects such as De Transparante Tuinder (The Transparent Grower), Meten op Slootniveau (Measuring at Ditch Level) and Waterkracht. Jim discussed several dilemmas with the growers, including hygiene and resilient cultivation. Another is the tension between trying to grow circularly, using circular substrates and fertilizers, and wanting to introduce as few substances as possible into a closed system, since they would later have to be removed again.
Jim van Ruijven, WUR
"Keep your business marketable"
Jerry, director of Yeald, addressed the financial side of horticulture. He explained that growers need to keep their businesses marketable by keeping up with the times, which includes preparing for zero-emission cultivation. If companies do not invest to meet increasingly strict requirements, the value of their businesses will be affected.
Labor and energy are likewise areas where growers must invest, he said. ESG, which matters to investment firms, also plays a role. ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) is a framework companies and investors use to measure an organization's sustainability and ethical impact.
Jerry van Leent, Yeald
ESG
Lumiforte is working actively on ESG, said Barry Zuidgeest, the coatings company's CCO. Hilde Viveen joined as sustainability manager in July and focuses on carbon footprinting and life cycle assessments (LCAs).
Paul van Gils explained in his presentation how coatings help growers achieve optimal cultivation. Growers present were quizzed on whether they were familiar with terms such as DLI, VPD and RTR. According to Paul, coatings are an indispensable tool for keeping the greenhouse climate in balance.
Growers ultimately benefit from Lumiforte's sustainability efforts too, for example because their customers expect the products used, even if it is "only" a coating on the greenhouse, to be sustainable.
Barry Zuidgeest, CCO of Lumiforte, explained how Lumiforte operates worldwide, with 4 production locations in the Netherlands, France, Germany and China. China produces only for the very large local market. For this, concentrate is shipped from the Netherlands to China. The special recipes for Lumiforte's coatings are carefully protected.
From residual material to fertilizer
Water boards also impose requirements on growers, for example on how coatings are removed from greenhouses. In the area covered by the Delfland Water Board, a ban on discharging rinse water has been in place since March 2026. The ban came fairly suddenly. Together with industry partners, a solution was quickly sought, such as capturing the water in basins or filtering and removing it.
In the longer term, Lumiforte is focusing on coatings for which the rinse water can be reused as irrigation water. This is currently being researched, and Barry said preliminary results look positive. The vision for the future is a coating that leaves no residue after rinsing but instead becomes a fertilizer.
Source: www.floraldaily.com
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