Cultiva EcoSolutions, Tallinn (2026)

31/03/2026

Dr. Emilia Mikulewicz has been appointed Country Director for Poland at the World Agriculture Forum.

Poland remains one of Europe’s most important agri-food systems, with strong production capacity, export relevance, and strategic importance in horticulture. The launch of the WAF Poland Country Council creates space for stronger dialogue between farm realities, innovation, sustainability, institutional priorities, and the long-term resilience of food systems.

As Founder and CEO of Cultiva EcoSolutions, Dr. Mikulewicz brings a systems-based agronomic perspective rooted in practical production realities, spanning water management, climate, microbiological processes, compliance, and commercial agriculture.

In a period shaped by climate pressure, market volatility, regulation, and the urgent need for more resilient production models, grounded and credible leadership matters.

Read the full article on the Cultiva EcoSolutions website:
https://cultivaeco.com/en/blog/cultiva-insights/world-agriculture-forum-poland-country-director/

13/03/2026

At the 14th International Blueberry Conference 2026 in Ożarów Mazowiecki, Dr. Emilia Mikulewicz shared a perspective that is still too rarely applied in commercial blueberry production:

Effective Botrytis control does not begin with the spray program. It begins with the system.

Held in Poland, one of Europe’s key berry-production hubs and the EU’s second-largest blueberry producer, the conference provided a highly relevant setting for discussing production resilience, disease pressure, and competitiveness in high-value fruit systems.

In blueberry production, Botrytis cinerea becomes a serious problem not simply because the pathogen is present, but because the production system creates the conditions that allow infection to establish, persist, and spread.

That is why control cannot be reduced to product choice alone.
It must be understood through the interaction of:

✅ plant architecture
✅ microclimate
✅ infection windows
✅ inoculum pressure and hygiene
✅ tissue susceptibility
✅ microbiome stability
✅ and the quality of agronomic decision-making across the season

This leads to one practical conclusion:

The first line of defense is not the active substance. It is the microclimate around the tissue.

When that environmental layer is not managed properly, biological solutions often underperform in the field. Not because the concept is wrong, but because biology applied without environmental fit, timing, compatibility, and system discipline rarely performs as expected.

From our perspective, durable disease control in high-value berry systems must rest on three interconnected pillars:

✅ microbiome
✅ plant physiology
✅ IPM strategy

When these three layers are aligned, the objective is no longer to “fight” the pathogen reactively.

The objective is to reduce the probability of infection at system level.

Our thanks to the organizers of International Blueberry Conference 2026, especially Jagodnik.pl, for creating a forum where practical production challenges can be discussed with the depth, seriousness, and relevance they deserve.

We also thank everyone who joined the session and continued the conversation afterwards.

This exchange confirms something we strongly believe at Cultiva EcoSolutions:

The future of crop protection belongs to growers and advisors who can connect biology, physiology, environment, and management into one coherent production strategy.

This is where resilient production systems begin.

For readers interested in a more structured summary of the session, we have published a short conference report on the Cultiva EcoSolutions website:
Botrytis Control in Blueberries: Key Insights from the International Blueberry Conference 2026
👉 https://cultivaeco.com/en/blog/ipm-strategies/botrytis-control-blueberries-conference-insights/

16/01/2026

International Blueberry Conference 2026 (Poland, March 5–6) — Ożarów Mazowiecki & Grójec 🇵🇱🫐

Cultiva EcoSolutions will be at the 14th International Blueberry Conference 2026, where Dr. Emilia Mikulewicz will share a microbiome-first approach to gray mold (Botrytis) management in blueberries—with a practical focus on fruit firmness, shelf life, and storage performance.

Why this matters for growers in 2026:
Gray mold is rarely “just a spray program” problem. Results are shaped much earlier by:
• Canopy microclimate and wetness duration (humidity pockets inside the fruit zone)
• Infection timing + field hygiene (latent infections that show up after harvest)
• Plant stress and nutrition balance (including calcium dynamics)
• The flower/fruit microbiome—and how it shifts under real field conditions

What the session will cover (decision-ready takeaways):
✅ Reducing postharvest losses and protecting commercial pack-out
✅ Tightening risk control from field → harvest → cold chain
✅ Where biological tools (Bacillus, Trichoderma, Pseudomonas) help preventively—and where they hit limits in practice
✅ Simple ways to connect canopy structure, irrigation/fertigation, and microbiome conditions to Botrytis pressure

If you’re attending March 5–6, come say hello—happy to talk Botrytis risk drivers, firmness & shelf-life protection, and practical ways to improve predictability without adding unnecessary complexity.

See you in Ożarów Mazowiecki and the Grójec region. 🇵🇱

Read more at:
https://cultivaeco.com/en/blog/cultiva-insights/international-blueberry-conference-poland-2026/

28/11/2025

Grey mould, residue limits and “mystery losses” in strawberries and raspberries are almost never solved by one more product 🍓🧪

That was one of the clearest messages from Berryforum 2025 in Poland – and it’s exactly what we unpack in our new article on the Cultiva EcoSolutions blog.

Instead of another spray calendar, we looked at what actually makes berry production retailer-ready in Central Europe:
🔹 IPM as a system, not a list of products:
Protection results are the outcome of hundreds of small decisions in irrigation, fertigation, pruning and tunnel ventilation – not just the last fungicide you applied.
🔹 Climate, microclimate & canopy first – chemistry second
Tunnel layout, ventilation strategy, leaf wetness and condensation patterns often decide whether grey mould explodes… or stays manageable with fewer, cleaner treatments.
🔹 Substrate & root-zone microbiome as the real “foundation” in raspberries:
Compacted or over-wet mixes, EC swings and low oxygen can quietly sabotage even the best fungicide or biological program. IPM products can’t rescue a chronically stressed root zone.
🔹 GLOBALG.A.P. & retailer residue limits as design constraints, not afterthoughts:
When plant protection, fertigation, climate strategy and hygiene are coordinated from day one around buyer protocols, audits become more predictable – and last-minute compromises are reduced.
🔹 Biology vs chemistry is the wrong question:
The real challenge is sequencing biologicals and chemistry in a way that protects fruit quality, manages resistance and still meets residue expectations in difficult, cloudy, wet seasons.

Central Europe is becoming a reference region for this type of resilient, retailer-ready berry production – but only where farms stop treating IPM, fertigation, climate and certification as separate silos.

We summarised the key lessons from the Berry Forum 2025 sessions in our latest article:
👉 “Towards Retailer-Ready Berry Production: IPM Insights for Strawberries and Raspberries from Berry Forum 2025”
🔗 https://cultivaeco.com/en/blog/ipm-strategies/berry-ipm-integrated-pest-management-strawberries-raspberries-grey-mould-central-europe/

If you’re working with strawberries or raspberries and are facing:
✅ repeated grey mould problems under tunnel/greenhouse conditions
✅ unstable yields or unexplained losses at sorting
✅ pressure from GLOBALG.A.P. and retailer residue limits

…this piece will help you reframe IPM from “what to spray” into how to design the whole system.

20/11/2025

Your NFT system isn’t “too sensitive”. It’s just telling you exactly where water management is off. 💧

In commercial NFT greenhouses and vertical farms, crops rarely crash overnight.
They slowly drift: a bit more variability between channels, a few extra trays downgraded, one corner that “never looks as good”.

On paper, pH and EC look fine.
In the channels, a very different story is playing out.

What we keep seeing in NFT diagnostics across herbs and leafy greens:
💦 Uneven flow along benches – a few millimetres more water depth ➡️ less oxygen, slower roots ➡️ weaker plants at the back of the channel.
🌡️ Cold or overheated nutrient solution – below ~16 °C or above ~24 °C, roots lose efficiency and disease pressure rises, even if the recipe is correct.
📉 Static recipes in dynamic conditions – EC and pH set “by habit”, not by light level, crop stage or return-line readings.
🦠 Biofilm, salts and debris creeping in – flow becomes less stable, oxygen drops, and pathogens gain an advantage in the recirculating film.
🧪 Spot checks instead of monitoring routines – parameters measured “when there’s time”, so early warning signals are missed.

The result isn’t always a visible disaster.
It’s often a quiet 5–10% loss in marketable yield on a €250,000–300,000 turnover – €12,500–30,000 disappearing from the balance sheet with no single “big failure” to blame.

When NFT water is managed as a full system (not just a tank with a target EC), growers start to see:
✔️ Stable water temperature around 18–22 °C, even in winter, so roots stay active and resilient
✔️ Consistent, shallow nutrient film across channels, protecting dissolved oxygen and root health
✔️ pH in the 5.5–6.2 envelope, adjusted with real plant demand instead of fixed recipes
✔️ Clear monitoring routines for pH, EC, temperature, flow and root condition – daily, not occasionally
✔️ Lower pathogen pressure, because hygiene and flow stability reduce opportunities for Pythium, Phytophthora and friends

In our latest article, we look at NFT water management from a practical, commercial angle:
🔹 How flow, temperature, pH and EC interact in real channels
🔹 Why low water temperatures quietly increase root disease risk
🔹 A simple checklist for daily pH/EC/temperature/flow monitoring
🔹 What you get from an NFT audit – diagnosis of bottlenecks, practical parameter ranges and an estimate of hidden yield/downgrade losses

👉 Read more: NFT Hydroponic Water Management: How to Control Flow, pH, EC and Temperature for Healthier Crops
https://cultivaeco.com/en/blog/irrigation-fertigation-management/nft-hydroponic-water-management-flow-ph-ec-temperature/

18/11/2025

Berry Forum 2025: Strawberry & Raspberry Protection in a Climate-Stressed World 🍓🍇

Many berry growers are asking themselves the same question right now:
“How do we keep plants healthy and yields stable when the season no longer behaves as expected?”

We’re pleased to share that Cultiva EcoSolutions will be speaking at Berry Forum 2025, the 2nd International Strawberry & Raspberry Conference in Ożarów Mazowiecki, Poland (26–27 November 2025).

Our founder and CEO, Dr. Emilia Mikulewicz (GLOBALG.A.P. Registered Trainer), will deliver two technical sessions focused on practical problem-solving under increasing climate and market pressure:

🔹 Strawberries – Biotic & abiotic pest pressure
How climate, crop architecture, production system and surrounding landscape reshape pest dynamics – and how to turn that complexity into robust, field-ready IPM programs that actually work across the whole season instead of “firefighting” outbreaks.
🔹 Raspberries – Microbiome, substrate & climate
Why substrate quality and microbiome balance, together with humidity, temperature and air movement, decide whether your raspberry blocks stay stable – or drift into chronic disease pressure, weak roots and inconsistent performance.

Across both talks we will connect:
IPM strategies • fertigation & substrates • climate (VPD) management • microbiome • modern plant protection programs
into one coherent, system-level strategy for commercial berry growers who need predictable results, not just new products.

If you are working with strawberries or raspberries and need to:
✅ Stabilise yield and fruit quality when weather patterns are increasingly erratic
✅ Reduce “mystery losses” linked to root-zone, microclimate or system design
✅ Align IPM, nutrition, microbiome and climate instead of treating them in silos

…Berry Forum 2025 is an excellent place to benchmark your current approach and discuss concrete adjustments with experts and peers facing the same challenges.

You can find more details about our participation and key topics in our latest article on the Cultiva EcoSolutions blog:
https://cultivaeco.com/en/blog/cultiva-insights/berry-forum-2025-strawberry-raspberry-conference-poland/

18/11/2025

Yellow Leaves in NFT Systems: Early Warning, Not Just Iron Deficiency 🌱

In hydroponic NFT systems, yellow leaves are rarely a single-element problem. They usually signal broader stress in the way nutrition, roots, and climate interact:
✅ Shared nutrient recipes that fit one herb but unbalance another
✅ pH ranges that look “fine” on paper but push sensitive species into chlorosis
✅ Root mats in channels that limit oxygen and create uneven feeding
✅ Rapid shifts in light and temperature that change demand faster than the recipe does

In our new article, we look at yellowing as a multi-factor signal—and why adding more iron chelate alone often doesn’t resolve it. The focus is on practical diagnostics and adjustments that protect yield and commercial grade in NFT lettuce and herb production.

👉 Yellow Leaves in Hydroponic NFT Systems: Causes, Nutrient Imbalances, and Practical Solutions
Link:

18/11/2025

Managing Fungal Diseases in Hydroponics: Start Before Symptoms

In controlled environments (CEA), fungal pathogens like 𝘉𝘰𝘵𝘳𝘺𝘵𝘪𝘴 𝘤𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘢, powdery mildew, 𝘗𝘺𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘶𝘮 spp., and 𝘍𝘶𝘴𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘶𝘮 spp. exploit the very conditions that make hydroponics efficient: stable climates, dense canopies, and recirculating water.

Why it matters:
✅ Fungal outbreaks in hydroponic systems spread fast and quietly.
✅ They impact both yield and food safety, especially for ready-to-eat crops.
✅ Once biofilms or inoculum build up, each crop inherits the last cycle’s risks.

🧪 Key levers to reduce pressure:
✅ Control humidity and airflow to break microclimate stagnation.
✅ Align fertilization with growth stage, not “more is better.”
✅ Keep nutrient solution cool (18–20 °C) and oxygen-rich.
✅ Sanitize tanks, emitters, and return lines systematically.
✅ Use biological controls (𝘛𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘮𝘢, 𝘉𝘢𝘤𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘶𝘴) early, not reactively.

💡 Many chronic disease problems trace back to design and hygiene gaps, not just “bad luck.” A biological-first IPM approach layered with disciplined sanitation turns systems from reactive to resilient.

👉 Read the full article:
Managing Fungal Diseases in Hydroponic Systems: Risks, Causes, and Biological Control Strategies
https://cultivaeco.com/en/blog/controlled-environment-agriculture/hydroponic-fungal-diseases-biological-control/

18/11/2025

𝐍𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐌𝐚𝐢𝐳𝐞 (𝐋𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞𝐬) 🌽: 𝐊𝐞𝐞𝐩 𝐃𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐲 𝐢𝐧 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐝𝐮𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧, 𝐍𝐨𝐭 𝐉𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐢𝐧 𝐕𝐚𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐬

As fields become more uniform, native maize is steadily slipping out of production.
This is not anti-hybrid. It is pro-diversity and grounded in risk management.

𝐖𝐡𝐲 𝐢𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬:
✅ Homogenization concentrates climate, pest, and market risk.
✅ Culinary and nutritional diversity narrows.
✅ Centralized seed systems reduce farmer flexibility and seed sovereignty.

𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐩𝐬 𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝:
✅ In-situ conservation + participatory trials: farmer selection to keep local adaptation alive.
✅ Agroforestry & diversified rotations: cooler microclimates, better water retention, lower disease pressure.
✅ Soil-first fertility with green manures, ferments and compost to support landraces under low-input systems.
✅ Short value chains: local processing, heritage gastronomy, CSA, and agro-ecotourism create demand for distinct varieties.
✅ Pre-breeding & targeted introgression: use landraces as reservoirs of traits (drought, heat, pests) while maintaining modern system fit.

𝐁𝐚𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐝 𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰:
Hybrids/GM: yield and uniformity in input-intensive, mechanized systems.
Landraces offer a broader genetic base, cultural value and resilience when markets reward distinctiveness.

👉 Read the article:
Native Maize Landraces: A Strategic Asset for Future-Ready Agriculture
https://cultivaeco.com/en/blog/biodiversity-agriculture/native-maize-landraces-future-agriculture/

Cultiva EcoSolutions

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