I've been meeting Chico from BioNova at trade shows for years, and we always end up discussing cannabis cultivation. And I have to say – Chico really knows what he's talking about. We’ve been planning this interview for a while, and the perfect moment came at the Mary Jane fair in Berlin. Our conversation is far from just a product promo – you’ll hear lots of useful insights you can apply to your own growing practice.
In episode 73, you’ll learn:
- What’s the difference in nutrition for photoperiod and autoflowering strains
- Who first came up with the PK13/14 formula known to growers everywhere
- Where all the coco substrate comes from
- Why and in what form to give silicon to your plants
- The advantages of using vegan fertilizers
Links:
Transcript:
Hello. Welcome to another episode of Cannabis Podcast. I'm, I moved from Amsterdam, from GreenTech directly to Berlin. And we are in a place where, Mary Jane in Berlin will start tomorrow, but, it's Thursday, and I met Chico here. Hello, Chico, nice to meet you.
Yeah, and we decided to make an interview because we have been talking about it for a longer time, and, we see each other quite often on the trade shows, on a different every trade show. Yeah. In so many years. Exactly. And under a different place in a different country.
So, it's always good to. Yeah. Spend time is good people. And Chico, will tell you something about BioNova fertilizers. And I will ask him some other questions.
So, Chico, can you introduce BioNova a little bit to listeners. Definitely. BioNova has been, family run company. It's, established in 1993 as one of the first three cannabis specific nutrient companies in the whole world. The owner of the company started growing cannabis 45 years ago.
Okay. He was the first guy, introduced with a few Americans and the Americans. They came to Holland because American government was having a war on drugs. So all the breeders and the genetic guys, they got just pushed out of the country. So they fled to Holland and Holland.
They found a group of Dutch people, and the founder of the company by Nova by accident, that my father was, yeah, he, started one of the two greenhouses with the Americas. He was a manager of 1 or 2 greenhouses. And in the past, there was nothing for cannabis available. There was just all the separate micrometer elements available in German markets. And so far, but.
And from Israel. But nothing was crucified for cannabis. So they started to really experiment about it. All the mixtures or different macro micro elements to find the right solution for cannabis. And it was a journey of about ten years.
And after those ten years the Dutch government said, hey, we don't like this anymore. And then they really put the coffee shops into a grey area where the supply of the coffee just vanished. You know, it's just. Yeah. So that point, all the guys from those greenhouses, they were on the streets and they were like, okay, what what can we do?
And the only thing my father knew was growing cannabis. That's all he knew in his life. And that's how he got raised and that's what he knew. So by by learning that curve of using nutrients he said hey there's nothing available in the markets. I've been doing this for almost ten years.
Let's create a brand about this. So that's where really it started to create BioNova fertilizers. That's that's the beginning. In 1993. And he did it together with or with a partner of his.
And there was a biologist, my father, who was the commercial guy. So he was traveling all around the world, and then a biologist in the lab, all day, all year round. And he was, developing the products. BioNova, What does it mean? Is it like, combination of.
I think everybody has questions about what is the name BioNova, what is the Nova parts? Yeah. And the in the past was they want to have, philosophy of three biological products and biological, but not organic. It can also be minerals, but the minerals that in the purest form available, Nova is, a Spanish word for innovation. So they want it to be a biological, innovative compare.
And that's what I mean BioNova came from there. Cool, cool. Let's let it go. So people are asking this why. I get, you know, I just get the question.
And before a lot of people think, oh, it's bio nova. So, it's everything is biological, organic. And that's not the case. Minerals can also be organic. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's right, that's right. How long is BioNova on the market? Who said that your father started 45 years ago. 32 years 1993 they started so 33. Yeah, I believe it's a long time already.
Yeah, yeah. And, you have, like, three part fertilizers or one part, you know, there is a different approach how to get, to the goal. So what is what is the way of BioNova? You know, in the end, we want, be able to supply every grower with their needs. And in beginning in 1993 BioNova was the company that started with a one components micro micro nutrients.
Okay. That has all the macor and micro nutrients ingredients just in one bottle for the simplicity of use. And that's where it started. And then with the PK 13/14, I think I can claim that BioNova was the inventor of PK 13/14 because we were the first ones to enter markets with that composition. And that's now the benchmarked in PK standards in the market nowadays.
Yes. Okay. Good to know. Good to know. It's pioneering of cannabis growing in, in Holland is really connected to people who escape from, U.S.
and also the Dutch skills, to growing any plants. But it's the whole world and are scarce. But nowadays the Holland is falling. So far behind. U.S.
has been taking over eight years. Now we are here in Germany. It's getting legalized and Holland is still going backwards. Yeah, we will see if, the, cannabis, experiment will change a little bit, but yeah, lots of obstacles. Also in this, in this field.
You told me that you started with, one part fertilizer. Yeah. Now you are continuing the same way with one part, or you have more parts. You know, like the markets also has different demand. So when other competitors did like a two component, we also have to do a more component fertilizer A and B and that's also after 2 or 3 years later we started with an A and B.
We always. had all the supernatural So we had a special super mix for soil cultivation, for hydro cultivation, even for NFT aeroponic systems. And nowadays you also have autoflower specialized one component fertilizer So even for sativa we have our specialized fertilizer. It's interesting for autoflowering strains. So, but what is the difference in formula like, you know, if I use, if I use your line for hydro, for example, is there what is the biggest difference for automatic strains It's mainly in the composition of the micro micro nutrients, as for example, a little bit more, nitrogen and a little bit more potassium.
Okay. Nitrogen, a little bit more is because the autoflowers tend to stay a little bit small. So we're gonna give it a little bit more power to the autoflower. Okay. To have it a little bit more stretch.
So it gets more branches more internodes. That way the autoflowers just performs a little bit better. Yeah. And we also add some organic components that work very well with the autoflower crops. It's interesting to talk about autoflowers because someone say they need more, nutrients.
Somebody say they need less nutrients, you know, not what is my experience if I count it together in one harvest? Of course, I need more nutrients for, for the, for photos, because they simply grow longer. And if I live longer, I need more, more food. But on the other end, my experience is that I cannot, under feed, autoflowering, that, what is your experience with it? You can you can always under feed a plan by just not giving it any nutrition.
Yeah. Well just having too low amount of nutrition in. Yes, but it always depends the amount you give. It depends on on a lot of factors. It's your environment.
You grow outdoors. I was the summer look like. Yeah. Yeah I did like only 15 degrees 20 degrees. Then the plant doesn't consume a lot of food when it's like heat other around the plant.
This was evaporating a lot. Yeah. It eats, Eats a lot more, nutrition. But also in indoor environments. When you work with the normal HPS and you now switch to LED and it needs also some other compositions of nutrition for LED because with all of the plants, it's just performing a lot more to eat more.
It's the same. I we always compare the plants on a human because we are both living organisms. And if you had a good, good sports, you need to eat extra. Yeah. So we fill your, to fill your, to fill your buddy.
And we fill your body with, with the energy. Yeah. Yeah. So that's. Yeah we have it's always comparable.
We are both living organisms. You can really compare it with each other. Yes. But if we have, like, everything else is, on the same level, for, the classics strain or for the photoperiodic sensitive strains and automatic strains. The when only difference is, nutrition.
So you have more nitrogen and more potassium. Right, in the general. And we add some extra organic components like so specific aminos. Yeah. Okay.
We did because BioNova always does research in different facilities. And BioNova does this research to really, showcase the protein approach really work. And then in the beginning is just for ourselves because we are not the company that still makes a lot of claims out there. While we know with the research we can do it. I wouldn't make the claims.
We just like to, to, share this knowledge with the people. And the person that we speak with, we share also the research documents and. Yeah. So you can see that really with some extra organic components. Without autoflowers, you get a better plant and a healthier plants and a better end product as well.
Yeah. And better terpene levels or better cannabinoids and the dry weight as well. If we, if you talk about BioNova products, what is your suggestion for autoflowering strains? What would you, what would you suggest me if I want to start to grow outdoor now it's June, so I still have a time. So would you like to, suggest me some of your, soil and with combination with some of your line?
You know, the the the substrate is not very specific for autoflower in the end the plant, the root system is the same as any other plants. Yeah. So the root system is in the same environment, the plant above that. But there's two ways to feed it. You can do even a liquid way or an organic pellets way.
So that is more creating like a living soil. So we have a product called ProfiMix and MicroLife. Okay. ProfiMix and MicroLIfe are both hundred percent vegan sources. So it's, pellet products that dissolves into the substrate and gets fertilization for 10 to 12 weeks.
So it's sort of full cycle for a cannabis plants. What I always suggest is these two products for the people that don't have a lot of knowledge, because you just mix these in your potting soil and after it, it's only ever adding water to the, to the solution and that's it. Yeah. Cool. No EC, no pH measuring that that just as simple as it can be.
Yeah. We even have employees in our company. They want to grow a simple because a lot of time they just put this in there. But like automated irrigation there with with water. And they don't look at it for three months.
Yeah. And the other solution is going with the liquid one. That gives you a lot more availability to steer with the nutrition. Because we always say nutrition, all these feeding charts that all the companies is made is always a generic number. Okay.
This is generic number for everybody to be working with. Safer. Yeah. And of course there's so many cultivars and every cultivar has its own demand for nutrients. Yeah.
Yeah. So we always say when you have a nutrient schedule, you can always add 5% on the dosage and watch the tips of your leafs. Yeah. And until the tips start to color a little brownish the top, they have to go back 5%. But some crops you can even add like 20% on top of the dosing rates that our company guys are probably also the other companies give.
So it's always finding the right dosing rate with your genetic that you are growing. Yeah. So that's the main thing. Yeah. So like everybody said you have this this is just not the perfect plan, like yeah of course not.
Because it´s generic, it´s to make everybody successful with their plan. Yeah I we always suggest like steps for 5%. When Brown tips for cure go back 5% know you're on the perfect level of nutrients. The perfect dosage. Yeah.
Cool. You mentioned the vegan. I know you have a vegan line,, so I don't know if someone, I think you are the first who came as a vegan line on the market. Yeah. So, explain me what?
What does it mean? Like, vegan line. Let me tell you a little bit. The background where the idea started, because that's also very important, I think when, medicinal cannabis started like nine, ten years ago in Canada on the U.S. Yeah.
The founder of BioNova, I was like, okay, now it's really time that we start to produce a medicine. And not a recreational products. And this has been a passion for him as well. And he said, hey, I want to do something back to the community. I want to create a nutrient that's as clean as possible with as clean as possible outcome of a flower.
Okay. So that was the main goal. And he then he started his research with his biologists and said, hey, how can they achieve the cleanest products? Okay, of course it's organic because we don't want the minerals and synthetics in there. Okay, but can we have a cleaner than just organic?
Because most organic products there are waste that's from slaughterhouses, that's blood meal, Bone meal, skin meam, fish meal, all that stuff. And that can be pollution in there as well, like antibiotics from the animal that's been slaughtered can still be wasted inside the products. So we started the the negotiation, which is with our team and biologists like okay, what should we do? Because it wasn't there yet. And then they said, hey, let's only focus on algae and plant materials.
So they were, I started. Look, okay. How can we implement plants materials. So that's plant waste matter. That's also algaes.
We have our own algae farming, Holland, where we grow our own algaes to put in the products We use, like, sea sand minerals. And that's because half of the Holland in the past, like a hundred million years ago, half of Holland was under the water. Yeah. When Holland got up there. Still sources in that land of old sea minerals.
So we dig those out as well. And all these, natural components are forming the veganic line. Okay. And it wasn't like our research of 4 or 5 years to get it right. Especially the potassium was impossible to get that was a 4 or 5 year challenge to get the potassium in a vegan way.
And it's almost impossible to achieve more than 2% of potassium in your mixture it's impossible in a vegan way. Like the nitrogen and phosphorus was not the big challenge. What the potassium was, was a big challenge. Yeah. And did you find a way how to solve it?
We fpund a way and we keep it a secret, because there was a five year research with many biologists. Yeah a lot of testing. So that's. Yeah. But in the end BioNova is a brand that's, it's very transparent about its ingredients.
Like, we now check our new, informational material you will find. We are the first company that really showcases what's inside our products. And why do we put it inside? And what are the effects on the plant in the end. And after the veganic line.
So we have a veganic grow. And we have veganic bloom. And. A year later, we came out also with a vegan PKL Okay, so we also have vegan pack additive to the veganic line. And then of course, all the bio stimulants are also all vegan because it's all based on the natural materials as well.
So even when it's, hard to get, potassium, you, have been able to find out how to make a PK with high content of potassium. Five. Only five. But there was no the research or the research before we started to get the, the 2% in the beginning of the product, we said, okay, the full focus on when we launched these products is get the potassium higher, because only then we can bring out the PK. When the ratio of potassium is higher.
than the phosphorus. Let introduce a little bit to your line, you know, so usually companies have something for soil or something for hydro, something for coco or whatever. What is your approach? What is your way? We do exactly the same thing because that's, in the end, what growers need to know.
Hey, I grow in a soil I grow in a coco. I grow on hydro or I grow aero. So you have always, part A, part B for a coco or, part A part B for hydro. Correct. Only for soil we do the one component and that's the organic product.
So it's a combination of mineral and organic. Okay. And in the end, what I always suggest to every grower, it always use a combination of mineral and organic. Yes. Because if you use macro micro nutrients as organic, because organic components are not available to the crop, the plants of the organic components need to transform into minerals in the substrate environment to be available to the plants.
Yeah, and that's a process that can take from one week up until four weeks. Yeah. Yes. And if you work only with organic components, it's very hard to steer. And even like I said, with the 5% extra dosage to get the best out of.
That's impossible with organics. So our suggestion is always use a combination of mineral and organic. So for example, our soil product is like 80% mineral, 20% organic components just to give it extra microorganism to have the soil life more active. I yeah that's right. It's some people doesn't know that.
But if you mix, organic fertilizer in the water, the EC will stay the same, because organic matter does not conduct electricity. We have nine bio stimulants. There's only one rise the EC of the 0.1. And that's it. If you add all nine of them.
So you see they does not influence on the EC. Organic growing is like hot topic. Everybody wants to do that. But I say it's okay. But as Chico said it's not it's not the easiest way how to grow.
I think that the main suggestion. Would be if you grow organic, before you put the plant in. Already Start to feeding the soil 2 weeks before. Because the minerals are already transforming. Or available in the end.
Even if you grow organically, you need the mineral, compounds in the soil. And but it's always important to look at the, the form of minerals because there are a lot of different types of minerals. Okay. And our products are, very low and ballast salts, heavy metals and chlorides. And if you look on the composition of other brands, sometimes you find like 6 or 7 times more chlorides or ballast salts or heavy metals inside the products.
And those always leave residues in your flowers as well. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. So it seems like.
We even get the feedback from our mineral products when we used organic before that the flower is even cleaner than before. And then another surprised, but I'm happy to see nowadays, even on the expo here we meet a lot of people that say no, no, no, I want from micro micro, I want pure mineral. And then I put organic additives next to it. Okay. What is the missing link stimulator?
Missing link. It's, unique. The BioNova products. Okay. Or this is also where a product we are very proud of its, fulvic acids.
But it's not just the fulvic acid. Normal fulvic acid you see in a bottle, a brownish blackish as a cover and a very not not transparent. This one is completely, yellow towards gold. And we we get this fulvic acid from 70 million old mine that's been, dig out by a family is a very small family company. That's also what we focus on.
We don't like to buy our sources from the big manufacturing companies. We always look for these small local family companies. And it can be in South America, South America, Asia, Middle East, really small family owned companies. And they bring out the quality that we are proud of to put in our product. Yes.
Yeah. So it's a combination of the best fulvic acid in the world with colloidal silver and this colloidal silver, that's what we also produce in our own factory with silver bars and stuff and this colloidal silver really gives, a high protective level for the crop and a high immune system. So we also say this product is for the ultimate immune system. So the plant is a lot more, protective against vulnerability to humidity, stress, and stuff like that. But also nutrient uptake.
The plant eats a lot more food with this products. Yeah. We also find that in research we can even try to EC more, and the plant is happy too. It it's. Yeah.
Interesting. What else we have? Cross-sell or cross-sell. Excel. Excel Excel.
Yeah. Okay. So you can say like XNL. Okay. If we say this as a cell, and this is also one of the first, simulators we had.
And this is our pure combination of amino, kelp, also a little bit of fulvic, but it's a lot of organic component in forms that can be put together and, it's completely free of hormones. So there we are very important. We don't put any hormones in our products because we want to have a natural stimulation to the crop. Yeah, yeah. And this brand is very pure.
Your, your flower booster, your flavor booster really have better flowers. Stick your flowers and better taste of flowers We we mentioned already, but you have a one soil, one kind of soil there. Correct. We just produce one soil of the highest quality. With a weak fertilization because in the end, we think people need to steer their own crop.
We can make a soil that's perpetually living soil. That's that's not where we stand behind. We are more into steering the plants. Yeah. So not just leave it up to the soil life.
We do make those products, but we always suggest always to add some extras to, add to reach the full potency of the product. Okay. But because you need only one soil mix and it's also fertilize in a vegan way. So basically, I can say a whole approach of vegan, even like minerals are also vegan, of course, so that we don't use any animal components in any of our products. Do you need some, certification for that?
Like if you want to say your product is vegan? Yeah, yeah, we do the certification we, do have OMRI certification and OMRI is like, yeah, it's a certified agency. And in the end, we can get like, ten different badges on the bottle, but, yeah, as long as we have one that's already proven that the sources inside are correct, and everybody can have, trust in that. And, and then. Yeah.
Yeah. That certification, of course. And we also have coco. So not only a soil we also have coco products or coco substrates. Really?
We have our own factory in Sri Lanka. So first we worked with this guy and then nine years ago we bought out this factory and now we doing this production together. Yeah. So we making like coco fiber just pure coco fiber. It's, washed and two times buffered EC is always guaranteed below 0.5.
Yeah. Because there's a lot of, coco that always are a little bit of both. But if you put, like a clone or cutting inside, they will probably start to starve. I have this experience that the cocoa has to be like, properly prepared for, cannabis growing. So, yeah, I love Sri Lanka as well.
This is a really nice country. So I think most of coco on the market is from, from there. Sri Lanka and India, that's the hub of all coco in the world. I think they're now trying to start something in the Caribbean area as well, because shipments from Sri Lanka all the way to U.S. and South America getting too expensive.
So that's recently been gone now to do it in the Peruvian area as well. And the cleaning and buffering you are doing on site in Sri Lanka or. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely after this. Good before has been package. There's all been washed buffer.
Yeah. So we do packaging in 50 liter Coco Fiber back. We make the, compressed bricks for like, small packaging, easy to to transports. And then we make, pop it back, so it's, pops and a cocoa in one. And it's packed, like, very small.
And you, as the water evaporate the cocoa. And then you have a growing parts and the soil already inside. Yeah, yeah. Cool. I know some companies do it in Europe.
Do they bring coco here and, everything is processing in here, so it's definitely better to do it over there. Better to do it on sites. I see the third bottle we have on the table is Silution. Definitely. Yeah.
So yeah, to finish off this line like we are now pushing these three products as the power to perform. Because we showcase these also in research. So we will start publishing these documents very soon. But. These three products really give a big edge to any crop, any cultivar.
And to finish off with a Silution. The Silution is a mono silicic acid. And it's a mono acid with a percentage of 1.85%. And we did a lot of research with different silicas: 1.65, 1.75, 1.85 and so forth until 2.7, 2.8. I suspect.
And we did this research to find okay. Because there's so many claims. And so it's such a big hype around the silica portion of market nowadays. Everybody's selling it and everybody's buying it. But nobody really knows what it's doing.
Okay. So tell us. Yes because the research we found out that normal silica so not mono-silicic acids, the crops cannot do anything with it. It's not even taken up by the crop. We measure it in a drainage as well, but it's still there.
Very. Drain the flower, the rockwool or the, or the soil, because they'll measure that. silica is available Yeah. Also in the dry weight cannabinoids, terpenes levels. There's no impacts.
So with the mono-silicic acid that's only the form of silica that gives the edge to the plant. And that's completely available to the plant. And we even add more fulvic acid from our fulvic acid source. It would make it more bioavailable as well. With the research, we found out that with, a 1.85, it's the maximum level for the plant to perform.
If everything above 1.85 plants started performing less, less weight. Less terpenes and less cannabinoids. So with the 1.85% we found out in generic cultivars 5% more harvests. And that's just only with this products. Okay.
You found 88% more terpenes and 32% more cannabinoids. And there was only just one product. Yeah. And a lot of people and I know this isn't a, it's an expensive source and it's an expensive on the markets. It's a very good product as an investment to your product.
Yeah. Yeah. And well we sell this product mainly to the bigger operations because they use it as a foliar application and it's very efficient. Like one time a week for your... Is it the foliar?
This is foliar application. Definitely. We say until we... And other two, the other two component components goes inside. You can even use it as foliar as well.
Yeah it's foliar, all of them them okay. And you can even foliar spray A and B if you want it. You can suggest it, but you can if you want to. Yeah. We always say until week two of flowering.
After that, don't do any foliar sprays in there. That's a key thing. So what is it. What was the amount. He said 32% more, cannabinoids?
Yeah, and 88% more terpenes. Okay. And 5% more harvest. Okay. It's only, for example, when you go up until 2.5% or average, about that, it's only 2 or 3% more harvest.
So it's already goes down when you use more percentage of silica. But 32% more cannabinoids. It's, it's a high number. It's like. Yeah, but it's not.
You go from 10 to 40% of THC. I understand it's a. Generic grazing. Defense, but if I have, 20%, so plus 30, if I have a 20% THC and plus 30%, it's 26%. So it's, like a decent amount of, Yeah.
We were very amazed as well. We thought, okay, it should do something to the dry weight. Okay. Especially the terpenes. We never expected that the silica product would improve the terpenes 88%.
So it's almost double the amount of terpenes. Okay. And it's not an organic products. It's mineral. Yeah I think I will try it for sure.
You're welcome. You can take some home now. But yeah that's really surprising for always. Everybody thinks okay the organic components kelp and stuff like that or vinasses, they will thrive on the flavor silica as well. Yeah.
Cool. Let's double up. So they're very. Very heavy information and I'm sure I will take one bottle for free. Of course.
Of course, because everybody get everything for free. Here at MaryJane. We are always open to share our products when people are interested. Yeah. It was.
And, yeah, it's first go by experience. Yeah. And then then they are free to buy it. Yeah. You know.
That's exactly. It's always trial it, before you buy it. Yeah, yeah. Cool. Chico I think, the show slowly starts and lots of people come because.
Oh, you got interrupted a few times. We have. Please say, sorry. Already got interrupted few times with people like. Yeah, yeah, I think the expo, I think, all of us are, a little bit surprised how many people came this year to Mary Jane.
I'm not surprised. I already tell us in Spanish, as I say to everybody, Mary Jane is going to be the busiest cannabis expo in Europe so far. Yeah. And already Friday, the first day or I had. A private Friday was simply unbelievable.
And I think today it will be not, we will be not able to pass this, ways Yeah. I only went to, bathroom stops yesterday, and the rest was just all people here. And I wish all of Europe is going to have this situation. Yeah. So, you know, be great.
If, this, what happened in Germany will spread also to other countries, to France to Czech, to Poland and maybe But, you know, in Poland also, the first THC grows are starting. Yeah. That's very, very moving forward. They have really nice, really good... You can, easily, become a patient in, Italy, like a cannabis patient in Poland.
Cannabis patient. And in pharmacies, there is a lot of, cannabis you can you can get from. Yeah. So Poland, like, it seems that it's, not a very cannabis friendly country, but the pharmaceutical business with cannabis is very well developed. Yeah.
And Poland is a... Thing on children's shoes, but it's it's the other thing, you know, it's another country that's opening up. So. Yeah. Exactly.
Let's all stand behind this movement. Cannabis plant should be legal everywhere around the world. So we hope that we will, with, help of all the nice people which, attended this shows... What is strange in the end, everybody's allowed to brew drugs at home. Yeah.
Alcohol, alcohol is also drugs. Of course. Why can't we grow our own cannabis. Like growing a. It is natural product is not not synthesized, it has anything changed.
It's just pure nature. It's an important thing is to be used in the right way. Yes. That's what I always say to people when you consume cannabis, know yourself and know your effects with cannabis. I know exactly how to use them.
When to use it or not. I never suggest anyone to do it all day. I think you can. We can say everything in moderate and never smoke alone. And because it's always good to share, these moments.
And and just like drinking. You're not going to go drink alcohol alone. Once you start to drink alone. You you are alcoholic. It's easy to start drinking beer every day.
Yeah. So yeah, definitely. And then you when you sit alone at home watching TV and drink beer and second then second is not okay. And the same thing is not okay to be hardely stoned every day Smoke a few joints. And I say, look, everybody does their own thing of course.
But yeah, I never suggested because also social thing I think. And that's also misunderstanding from a lot of civilians around Europe and the rest of the world. It's when people smoke cannabis, their lack of motivation, lack of energy, lack of getting out of bed. But as you know, most people we know smoke cannabis. They go on a mountain bike tour or 50km.
They don't. It's a different, different aspect. Than normal people who lives normal lives. And for example, we even sponsor athletes that compete with, freestyle motocross in the X-Games in the U.S and these guys, they, they smoke a joint before they hit the big ramps. Yes.
It's also to relax their minds to be able to conquer that fear. But it's also they do the most extreme sports under the influence of cannabis. If they were drinking. Alcohol They would never jump. Yeah.
Yeah they would maybe try it but. Right. Yeah. That's right. Okay.
Chico, do you have some message for growers like mostly home growers listen to us about also some people who grow in a larger scale. What's your suggestion for small and larger growers? Let's divide it. I think in groups. I think in general, what's, I see the most growers make the mistake with is that they.
And it's, of course, in any industry here, because this cannabis industry is a marketing industry, okay? Every product has been marketed so well. There is not always a truth. So I think people should really dive into more dive into forums and into grower communities to find out the right way. Then just read stories from companies.
Yeah. So really do your own research. And that's funny what I see now here in Germany because it's legal people also feel safe to do the research. Yeah. Yeah.
So I speak to people here yesterday for example. They never grew before but they had questions. But some people grow for ten years. They never ask those questions. Yeah.
Yeah. So they already see the change with when the legal situation gets there. People are also more motivated to really learn more about us because it's the stigmas getting off. Yeah. For large scale growers.
And yeah, of course it's always efficiency. So keep the old systems, all the input of products as efficient as possible. And really look at your ROI, of course. And also the, the companies that you work with need to become a partner and not just a supplier. Yeah.
So that's why we also stand by. We just don't want to supply you the products. But sometimes we have customers and yeah, I want all the simulators and A and B okay. But I want to first look at your system, your climate, the whole circle of the growing operation. And if that's not correct I'm only going to sell them A and B.
Because the simulators it's a waste of money because he first needs to invest his money on the right HVAC, the right lightning, the right old strip of rubber equipment. So yeah it's really important to to look at the whole circle and not just a nutrients. Yeah. And that's what we do. We are becoming partners to our customers.
When a large scale grow and we work closely together with consultants that are based in Holland, that are influence with our research as well. So that's yeah, that's something that's really cool. I think even the resource center is going to start a training very soon. Yeah. Can maybe share some information.
I don't know if Innexo is not very famous yet, but I think in a few months they will start publishing, real legal cannabis training, in a cannabis, a greenhouse in Holland. Yeah. So every person in Europe, they can book like a week or two week lecture inside a greenhouse full of cannabis plants. Yeah, yeah. And that's the best way to learn.
It's. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Okay Chico. thank you very much.
I'm. I'm very happy that you join me in this episode of cannabis podcast. I wish you good luck with all your projects and whatever it will be in the future. And I'm sure we will see each other in the future. in the future we on the front page of the book.
Yeah, yeah. Good talking to you guys. Thank you. And thank you. I thank all of you that you listened to us.
I hope you got some useful information. And I do give a try to BioNova as well as I will. And we will see what beautiful results we will have. I wish you healthy plants and good life. Ciao.
Thank you very much for watching. And, if you always have any questions, we are always open. If you send us a message on Instagram, we will reply within 3 or 4 hours. And always love to help the growers become better. Okay, perfect.
If I say bye bye, bye bye cruel dudes. How long did. Reports? 35 minutes.