This is an interview (June 2, 2020) on the Farm Like a Hero series in which Richard Perkins speaks with Pieter Ploeg about Fruhtown Van West, a six-hectare diverse family farm on the outskirts/within city limits of Amsterdam. The farm—started by owner Bill Sterkenbaum around 2014—centers on an intensive orchard (about 45 fruit varieties: 8 apple, 3 pear, 14 cherry types plus berries and grapes) and has diversified into multiple enterprises: laying hens, collaborated pasture-based broiler broilers, pigs, cows on a nearby field, mushrooms, indoor chicory, nut trees, a Christmas-tree project, a cheese workshop, cafe and organic farm shop, event spaces (including a cob house). Staffing combines the resident family (three children), one full-time and one part-time farm manager, many volunteers (roughly 15 on an average day), seasonal/rotating cafe/shop staff (10–15 typical; non-COVID summers up to 20–30), and interns from the Dutch Organic Farm School. The farm is positioned as a city-adjacent green-recreation project and hosts public events and farm-to-table activities.
Questions this video answers
Fruhtown Van West
Six hectares
2014
Bill Sterkenbaum
About 45 different varieties
Chapters
Okay. Welcome to a new episode of Farm Like a Hero, folks. I'm Richard Perkins. Today I'm here with Peter Plogg of Fruhtown Van West. That's a six hectare diverse family farm on the outskirts of Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Peter was one of our early interns at Ridgedale and whilst he isn't the owner of the farm, he joined as a collaborator to establish a pasture based broiler enterprise fitting within an already existing orchard system. And I think it's a really interesting example to talk through and hear about today. I'm super excited for this episode and to catch up with Peter. So welcome, Peter, and thanks so much for taking the time to talk with us today.
Thank you.
Nice backdrop of the farm there. I can see the boilers moving through the orchard. That looks like a bit of a farm to table event there.
Yeah. So this is indeed the broilers. They're coming through in the background all the way along. Normally the farm would be available for weddings and parties and so on, so. And people can rent these sort of nice orchard tables. And just in front here, which you can't see in this photo, is the terrace of the cafe. So usually this is a very typical site.
Beautiful. So it's quite a diverse operation there. I understand that the family started it up in 2014 and based primarily around the intensive orchard, but then there's a whole lot of livestock and other things going on. Can you tell us a bit about that?
Yeah. So the owners and current managers have a background in fruit production. Bill Sterkenbaum, the owner, grew up on organic orchards and at some point produced the most organic apples in the Netherlands as a single farmer. But he wanted to diversify, so they started with planting fruit trees. But he went from two to three varieties of apples and pears that he was used to to currently about 45 different varieties of fruit. So there's eight different varieties of apples, three different varieties of pears, 14 different types of cherry, raspberries, gooseberries, grapes, strawberries. Yeah, I could name the whole list. So basically, diversity of fruit. And his initial animal enterprise was to have laying hands. So that's what he had sort of from the beginning. And over time they've added broilers. That was mainly in collaborating with me, but since then also pigs with a specific purpose, cows on a field just across the road, mushrooms, indoor chicory indoors. And they're currently also growing nut trees and have a Christmas tree project. There's a cheese workshop on the farm. Then there's a cafe, an organic farm shop Space for weddings. There's also a cob house that's recently been built as an event space. So you could say like per season about two to three enterprises are added on the farm.
It sounds like quite a handful. So how many people are working there then? It must be more than just the family now.
So the family, they live there with three children, they employ one full time farm manager and then one part time farm manager. The rest of the outside farm work is done with volunteers, which there is an absolute abundance of here in Amsterdam. People are craving to be outside and help out. So on an average day there might be about 15 volunteers eager to help outside on the farm. We also collaborate with the Organic Farm School in the Netherlands. So interns from the organic farmers training will come for half a season to a season to help out on the farm. And then there is a separate staff that runs the cafe and supermarket. So they have sort of like one manager for the cafe, one manager for the shop, and then a rotating list of about 10 to 15 people and in a non Covid summer season, up to 20 to 30 people running cafe in shifts in the summer.
So it sounds like quite the operation and obviously the social elements very strong there. Being near the city and I understand the original idea was to help connect people from the city to their food. Is it like situated right on the outskirts of the city?
Yeah, it's situated within city limits on this picture behind me by the tall trees. Basically behind those trees at the edge of the farm is a highway and railroad track. Just west of the farm is a highway. East of the farm is sort of like a sports fields area that's just outside the last neighborhood. And then south of the farm is basically a park that extends to the airport. So it's a very dense area. It's the last green belt on the west side of Amsterdam. And it's a very unique project that fits within the vision of the city of Amsterdam to provide green recreational areas that are not just parks at the edge of the city.
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