Samen oogsten, samen koken: Lelystadse Oogstdagen 2025

4 september 2025

This week, it’s happening: the Lelystad Harvest Days 2025. Every year, hundreds of elementary school students from Lelystad visit a farm to get their hands in the soil. This year, nearly 600 children will learn how carrots, potatoes, onions, and other seasonal vegetables grow in Flevoland’s fertile ground.

For many children, this is the first time they’ll see up close where food really comes from: not from a supermarket shelf, but from the soil, the farmer, and the season. When a subsidy was withdrawn, the Harvest Days were at risk of disappearing, until the HIP Circular & Digital partnership stepped in. Within this partnership, education, government, and entrepreneurs work together on a future-ready economy. For the 2025 Harvest Days, ROC van Flevoland, De Lelystadse Boer, and Food Pioneers are joining forces.

Food Pioneers for every generation

Through this partnership, Food Pioneers brings expertise in food transition and circularity. The Harvest Days are a great opportunity to give the next generation an extra layer of knowledge. And knowledge sticks best when you engage the senses, which is why this year the Harvest Days are being organized for the first time in collaboration with TommyTomato. Their mission is to turn every child into a lifelong vegetable eater, and there’s no better place to learn that than on a farm. With guidance from a team of real “Soeperchefs,” children take a cooking class and experience firsthand how fun and tasty it is to cook with local vegetables.

The plate of tomorrow

Food Pioneers focuses on the plate of tomorrow: what will our food look like in the future, and how can we make it healthy, sustainable, and accessible for everyone? With that mission, a cooking class is a natural fit. Children get the full experience - from soil to mouth, from seed to soup. In this way, curiosity, appreciation for farmers, and enjoyment of cooking are planted early. A partnership to be proud of.

Lelystad harvest day for the public

Alongside the Harvest Days for elementary school students, De Lelystadse Boer also hosted an open harvest day for the public on Saturday, August 30. Visitors came to the farm to harvest vegetables themselves, taste the produce, and meet the farmers behind the initiative. TommyTomato was there as well and led a workshop.