The jury considers it an enormous achievement how Jessica and Maurits, as new entrants into agriculture, have developed a fully-fledged agricultural company from scratch in a short period of time.
Most of all how they did this: based on a very clear vision of what a sustainable livestock farm should look like, with two important starting points: nature inclusion and circular agriculture. In their view, this also includes a robust cow breed, which is why they opted for the Groninger Blaarkop, an old Dutch cow breed and used their qualities to preserve this old breed. To realize their vision, they started a partnership with Natuurmonumenten and Staatsbosbeheer (Dutch nature organizations), and it is precisely this collaboration between agriculture and nature that has become the core of the company.
Ultimately, sustainability requires a good business model. Jessica & Maurits started milking in 2020 and market both the cheese and the meat through their own webshop and through local farm shops.
Congratulations and good luck with the further development of your company!
Watch a video about this farm on Youtube (for EN caption click settings wheel and set auto generate captions).