Horticulture and Marketing
Bachelor of Agribusiness and Business Administration
Career opportunities
The sector supplies raw materials and other inputs for the food, flower and pharmaceutical industries. As a graduate, you are ready for staff, management and advisory positions in the first stages of horticultural value chains. Your utmost unique selling point is the ability to have a role in both supply and demand chains all over the world. You have solid technical knowledge regarding horticultural products and cultivation. In addition you're aware of market requirements and are able to create and utilize market opportunities, whether it is in a local or in a global setting. You can have a leading role in product or process innovations in horticultural chains as well.
For a role in the first stage of a value chain, graduates are prepared to work in a competitive arena within various cultural environments. You can accomplish organisational and decision making tasks, independently leading a team of employees. On the other side a graduate is a team player, contributing in strategic issues and supporting the higher management of the company.
After finishing your study, you may work in the tropics, or you could be internationally active in the Netherlands - a country that exports half of its agricultural output, yet whose supermarket shelves are full of foreign products. There are plenty of potential positions for you. You might become a product manager in a seed business in Tanzania, or a manager in an avocado production company in Thailand. Or, as a crop protection specialist at the Aalsmeer flower auction, you might be responsible for improving the quality of foreign flowers. Other examples are farm manager, quality manager, marketing and sales manager, researcher and extension worker.
Fetze Admiraal from the Netherlands
Plantbreeder (onion, garlic & shallot) at De Groot & Slot Allium
"After graduation I immediately started applying for work although it crossed my mind to do a research master in plant science at Wageningen University. Nowadays I'm working in plant breeding at De Groot & Slot Allium. This means working in an international research and development environment with strong commercial tendencies as well as some practical tasks. For me this practical part generally means doing the onion bulb selection and checking small plots of flowering plants set up to produce 'foundation seed'.
The most interesting for me is the contact with the research laboratory, the trips to the field trials in Holland and abroad and getting to know the different markets and their demands. Improving the product (onion) while keeping an eye on customer demands is a never ending story. In the future I'd like to know all the breeding lines, the different markets and follow the developments in plant research, especially those in the ever changing field of molecular biology."
"Use placements to find out what you like most. Steer your study in the direction you prefer. Don't miss the opportunity to spend time in another culture."
"I really enjoyed Van Hall Larensteins' international focus in the theoretical and practical tasks."