The Field Guideby Moss & MarrowGroentekwekerij De Nieuwe Ronde
- No synthetic pesticides or fertiliser (certified)
- Nature-inclusive farming
De Nieuwe Ronde is a self-harvest vegetable garden on the Oude Diedenweg on the Wageningse Eng, where one grower and about 225 members, helped by volunteers, have grown vegetables and fruit together since 1998.
The fields carry a long list of crops through the season, from March to early December: potatoes, kale and cavolo nero, leeks, beetroot, field cucumbers, beans and peas, pumpkins, salads, winter purslane, sorrel and herbs, along with strawberries, raspberries and red and black currants. The garden is certified organic (SKAL); we found it in the register. According to their website it uses compost but no artificial fertiliser and no pesticides at all, and it works to leave room for wildlife on the land.
There is no shop or box scheme; instead you take out a harvest subscription, which makes you a member of the association that runs the garden alongside the grower, and you then come to the field to pick what you need on any day of the season. Members share in both the harvest and the risk of a poor year.
It began as one of the first community-supported gardens in the Netherlands and calls itself the oldest garden in the country working with self-harvest subscriptions.