The first years

In 1967 I started my own small construction shop in Enkhuizen called van Dok & de Boer. The company was located in the backyard of Royal Sluis Seeds (now part of Seminis Vegetable Seeds). The people at Royal Sluis needed parts for both new and older equipment. My company was building equipment and parts only for Royal Sluis. In those days, seed companies did not exchange information with each other, they did not like it when suppliers were selling to other competing seed companies.

Because my company had a lot of work in all kinds of construction work, we moved to another facility in an industrial area in Enkhuizen. During the construction of expanding the building, there was an accident which burned the whole facility down to the ground. This was a difficult period for me. Only some drawings of seed processing equipment were saved. Looking at those drawings, I started to wonder whether this equipment  could be sold worldwide? I made the decision to start up again and focus on equipment only for the seed industry. 

We wanted to be different in the marketplace. We wanted to offer complete processing lines. We saw that there was a need for this worldwide. At that time we changed our name from "van Dok & de Boer" into "Seed Processing Holland BV", because this new name told our potential customers exactly what we were doing.

The market in which we operate is relatively small. To be a seed machinery manufacturer in the Netherlands, you have to distinguish yourself from other suppliers around the world.

Because labour costs are high in the Netherlands, we have to produce high quality machines to have the right to exist in this business.

Our machines have to be original, accurate and reproductible, and we must provide good support to our customers around the world. Today, because of the new technologies, we can support some of our products, such as our seed dryer, filmcoater and priming system, electronically via modem.

There has always been a fundamental need for cleaning seeds which goes back centuries.

Sorting seeds on size, weight and colour can improve the quality of a seed lot. These sorting activities were mainly done by hand. More than 100 years ago, you could already see in some seed companies a certain level of automation such as air separators (winnower) or air screening machines.

Seed Gravity Separator

Based on seed weight, this machine separates light and heavy seeds/parts in several fractions. In the past this technique (roll up) was done by hand, it was and still is a very difficult technique, and only a few skilled seed cleaning specialists can do it.

Seed Colour Separator

Based on the colour of the seed, this machine can separate a seed lot. It works with cameras. For example you can remove infected black seeds out of tomato or pepper seed, black lettuce seed from white seed, green beans from white beans, etc. Nowadays we sell colour separators that can separate many tons of seed per hour.

Seed Priming

This technology enhances seeds, which will give the grower a faster germination, more uniformity, more first choice plants etc. In principle, 4 different seed priming methods are available: Drum Priming, Solid Particulate Priming, Osmotic Priming and the Seed Conditioner (water vapour pressure conditioning). We sell equipment for two methods: Osmotic priming and the Seed Conditioner.

This process came from the pharmaceutical industry. Making the shape of a seed different, using powders and liquid. Seed that is difficult to sow, such as begonia or lettuce, can be pelleted. The nice round shape of the seed pellet makes it very easy to sow, and prevents double seeds in trays or in the field. We offer the complete pelleting equipment range.

Seed Sizing (Calibrating)

With very accurate screens, in a fairly slow process, "naked" seeds can be sized on the diameter with 0.05 mm difference (100^e inch). In this way you can separate male and female lines, but also create again uniformity in plants.

Nowadays the market is  more and more demanding sized seeds.

Our sizers are used mainly in flower and vegetable seed processing.

Using cameras. this process counts seeds 1 by 1. Instead of selling seeds by volume or by weight, seeds can be counted as well. In this way you are not depending on the DKG (thousand corn weight). You can actually sell exactly the seeds that you need to sell. Therefore you will never sell too much seed, which will save you money in the end. We developed a wide range of counting equipment to do this.

As an example, 20 years ago seed companies used to come to me and to tell me about the problems they had with damage to seeds during the threshing and extraction processes. It is very important to listen to the problems the seed companies are experiencing and to find the solution together. We could not develop our equipment without the practical experience of the seed companies. Together with the seed production managers and the technical managers we started to design machines. Most of the time the result was that we got the order to build the equipment. Agreements were then drafted which specified whether or not we could sell the new equipment to other seed companies.

In this way we developed rotary seed threshers, belt threshers and seed extraction machines. Seeds where no longer damaged in the beginning of the process so this would prevent a lot of problems in seed cleaning and germination. These machines were and are particularly successful in our company.

Another problem the companies had was with the drying of seeds. Seed companies dried their seeds with non-conditioned ambient air. This meant that a drying process could take 2 days or maybe a week, depending on the ambient air conditions. This could mean that the seed quality could go down, because seeds remained wet for too long. After studies, it appeared that drying in a controlled conditioned way could keep a good germination / quality of the seed lot.

We listened to these problems and we developed our own conditioned drying system. We began also to rotate the seeds during the drying, in order to have a uniform drying process, no double seeds and a polishing effect (like on tomato). This was something the market was waiting for. This dryer is still very successful because you can use it for all kind of seeds or pellets and every harvest year under each ambient weather conditions you can have the same quality drying process. "You know what you are doing"

Because we have a good reputation in the market we also notice that inventors of universities or individuals contact us to work together on creating a new or improved seed processing technique. Sometimes this results in a new machine, but you always have to pay attention to the market and determine whether this is really what companies could use in practice.

I will never forget some experiences I had during my travels.

One time I was in Indonesia (Java) for a survey on a seed cleaning project. During a walk through the trial fields, I met the seed growers. They where so proud and honoured that I visited them, that I got a bag of potatoes to bring back with me to Holland. Of course I accepted this gift, which was a serious deal for those people. I had to carry this 25 Kg bag a few miles over the Sawas as we where walking on, knowing that I could never cook them in my hotel or take them home with me.

In Russia, Kazakhstan we also finished a seed cleaning project. The Ministry of Agriculture supported this. During a ceremony as an honoured guest, I was rewarded with a medal as best worker of Kazakhstan. I had to wear a traditional costume and they prepared a cooked sheep head. I had to cut this head, and I had to give it to the other guests on the table. Each part of the head had a different meaning, like the ears (the person who got this, could listen well) the eyes (you noticed every small detail) etc. I was lucky I had a strong stomach and a good appetite!

I am proud that we are accepted worldwide by the seed companies, and I believe that our customers like the fact that we visit them each year. We are also members of the ASTA, APSA and ISF. By attending the conferences of these associations we can inform our customers regularly about new technologies and developments.

Because I am an engineer, I am very happy that we draw our equipment in 3-D. We can also communicate with architects around the world on turnkey projects. We send the drawings by email back and forth.

When I look back, I do not think I would do things differently if I had to start again. You loose some and you win some, as the saying goes. Of course, we had our share of difficult times, for instance when the economy was slow in the early nineties. But this is the risk I took as an entrepreneur. I always stood behind our products. During my career I have witnessed the evolution in communication technology like telex, fax, email and Internet. We used this a lot. I was fascinated by these quick developments.

I have now been retired for over a year. I must say that after 45 years of working hard I rather like it, although it took me more than half a year to get used to it. I did not have appointments! And now I think I can make appointments with my wife, but she does not want to do this, what can I do?

Anyway I know that the company is in good hands. And I hope that they have the same luck and opportunities in business that I once had.