The Netherlands will be the Country of the Year at Biofach 2015, the world’s leading trade fair for organic food, which is currently taking place in Nuremberg. Dutch Agriculture minister Sharon Dijksma signed the contract that promotes the Netherlands as a growing market for sustainable food products. «I am pleased that being Country of the Year in 2015 gives us an excellent opportunity for presenting the quality, variety and sustainability of Dutch organic agriculture to a professional international audience», says Minister Dijksma, quoted by a press release of the international german fair. The Dutch organic sector showed very positive development over the past years. There are currently some 1.500 companies, which produce such food on about 54,000 hectares of agricultural land (63% pasture). Dutch consumers generated average sales of 46 euros per inhabitant for organic products in 2011. This is an above-average rise of 10% over the previous year and appreciably more than the average in the European Union. Similar to the situation in Germany, the organic products consumed are mainly eggs, fruit and vegetables. The Netherlands meanwhile achieves total annual sales of some 2 billion euros with biological food. Exports are estimated to account for some 900 million euros of this figure. About half of these go to Germany, followed by Belgium, France, the United Kingdom and Scandinavia.
