The 2025 Fruit Logistica event features an outstanding program. Once again, the pressing issues of our times take center stage.

For many countries the fresh fruit sector is a key part of the economy. This applies just as much to industrialized countries as those in the global South. The overall conditions in the sector are in constant flux, whether due to changing consumer behavior, political developments, the digital transformation or the effects of climate change. For decision-makers along the entire value chain, this means constantly adapting to new circumstances and demonstrating their creativity, flexibility and innovative drive.

The event program of Fruit Logistica 2025 provides up-to-date background knowledge, with over 100 experts inviting exhibitors and trade visitors to discuss the latest trends and forward-looking concepts.

Fresh Produce Forum: Find Out What Makes the Industry Tick

Discover the answers and more at the Fresh Produce Forum! From meeting consumer expectations to addressing societal challenges, explore how continuous innovation and strategic insights are shaping the future of fresh produce.

What will tomorrow’s markets look like? What are the strategies for succeeding in these markets? The ‘Fresh Produce Forum‘ sessions, taking place during Fruit Logistica 2025, last one hour and are centered around these questions. The use of AI to reorganize supply chains, current breeding techniques that can be used to adapt seeds to a wide range of environmental conditions and consumer preferences, product safety management in the face of rising regulatory requirements, and rising consumer demands are some of the topics covered.

Participants can immerse themselves in the intricate pricing processes along the supply chain, learn about the updated EU marketing standards for fruits and vegetables, and discover how to use limited resources like energy, water, and soil sustainably, using Morocco as an example.

Climate change and social advancements are continuously changing the general landscape of the fresh produce industry and posing problems for it. To master them, the Fresh Produce Forum is a valuable resource.

Future Lab: Securing Yields With Intelligent Technology

The rise in extreme weather events, the over-exploitation of natural resources, and the decline in biodiversity are among the greatest challenges of our times. The effects are also fully impacting the international fruit and vegetable industry. At the Fruit Logistica 2025 Future Lab, innovative solutions will be presented in compact half-hour sessions on how to safeguard harvests and reduce food losses despite difficult environmental conditions. These include the diagnosis and eco-friendly control of emerging fungal pathogens, the use of smart sensor traps for pest control, and the identification of genetic markers that make it possible to control the flowering time of pome and stone fruit.

Ryp Labs, a Belgian company, is presenting a simple process that can extend the shelf life of fresh produce by several days. This is achieved by the coating on their food-safe StixFresh stickers, that mimics the plant’s natural defense mechanisms. Scientists at the University of Zurich have shown that it is possible to not only vaccinate humans and animals but arable land too. In this case, it is beneficial fungi that promote soil health.

Logistics Hub: Safe, Fast, and With Low Emissions From A to B

Whether sea or air freight, road or rail freight transport, smooth cold chain logistics are essential for sensitive products such as fruit and vegetables. During the Logistics Hub, exporters and representatives of transport companies report on how they ensure their goods arrive at their destination intact and on time, as well as the digital technologies they employ.

The planned Rotterdam Food Hub promises to be just as forward-looking. The ultra-modern refrigerated logistics center is set to revolutionize the handling of fresh produce at Europe’s largest container port. The same also applies to the multi-purpose deep-water port of Puerto Antioquia on the north coast of Colombia, which is due to open in early 2025 after a three-year construction period. The long-awaited project aims to shorten transit times and make the fresh produce trade more competitive and sustainable.

Tech Stage: Future-proof Packaging Solutions and Smart Greenhouse Technology

The Tech Stage is where exhibitors will deliver 20-minute pitches presenting their machinery and technology innovations to trade fair visitors. Sustainability and digitalization dominate the agenda here too. For example, DS Smith from Austria, which specializes in recycling and paper production systems, reveals why even after 25 years corrugated cardboard is still an up-to-date packaging material.

Multivac, from Germany’s Allgäu region, will showcase its wide range of integrated packaging lines.

Blue Radix from the Netherlands is exhibiting its Crop Controller, an AI-based system that independently optimizes and controls the climate and irrigation in greenhouses.

The greenhouse specialist Ridders, also based in the Netherlands, will showcase smart water management and plant monitoring solutions.

Farming Forward: Supporting Climate-resilient, Efficient and Sustainable Agriculture

The Farming Forward stage focuses on how new technologies can help to make agriculture more productive and sustainable. Here, trade visitors can look forward to three formats. On the first two days of the trade fair, exhibitors in the Smart Agri Area will present digital technologies for open-air and greenhouse cultivation – from non-invasive fruit quality testing using spectral photography to digital insect monitoring and drone-assisted pesticide use.

The afternoons will be dedicated to cultivation topics under controlled environmental conditions, better known as Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA). The US-based CEA Alliance is organizing six workshops to shed light on the potential of this type of cultivation. Participants will hear from farmers and technology providers about how CEA can make food production more climate-resilient and efficient, the economic viability and sustainability of vertical farming, and whether greenhouse produce requires different packaging solutions for outdoor crops.

On the Friday of the trade fair, the Leibniz Institute for Agricultural Engineering and Bioeconomy (ATB) Potsdam will introduce a scientific as well as a practical perspective at the Science Symposium. Scientists from all over the world will present fascinating findings from basic and applied research. The program includes several short presentations on storage, packaging, food health, and phenotyping (the use of modern technology to identify external plant characteristics), as well as AI.