Growing Dutch in Sao Paulo.

• Author: Hein, Jo Ann
• Position: Brief Article

In Holambra, Brazil, the spirit of the old country blooms brightly, as thousands of tourists visit the town to celebrate the annual Expoflora.

ONE OF THE MOST colorful harbingers of spring in the Southern Hemisphere is Expoflora 2000, the largest exhibition of flowers and plants in South America. This year a quarter of a million visitors are expected to flock to Holambra, the small municipality in the interior of the state of Sao Paulo, Brazil, where a "family" cooperative of Dutchmen and their descendants have created a reference center for florists, floriculturists, and ornamental horticulturists.

Counting on visitors becoming "Overcome with Emotions"--this year's theme--organizers continue to improve the permanent site, updating it with the latest technology and diversifying and enlarging the exhibit areas. And, as new plant varieties are developed by Holambra's horticultural geneticists, Expoflora has become a "must" to the South American flower trade.

In 1981 producers and artistic floral arrangers exhibited their products in a local club with the idea of stimulating sales. An overwhelming twelve thousand visitors arrived the first week. This initial success established Expoflora as a permanent annual event, now in its nineteenth consecutive year--and fifty-two years since the first founding immigrants arrived in Brazil from the Netherlands, fleeing the aftermath of World War II, and set up a cooperative raising dairy cows. They succeeded in establishing a farm, but cattle disease forced them to diversify. Their subsequent endeavors with wheat, fruits, poultry, and especially, flowers led to the creation of the Holambra Agricultural Cooperative, today a major Brazilian exporter.

Along state highway 340, leading into Holambra, endless fields of blooming chrysanthemums come into view, then verdant orange and lemon orchards beneath clear-blue tropical skies. Dutch impressionist Vincent Van Gogh would have made much of these vivid yellows, greens, and blues, and he wouldn't have had a problem with the language either--a good 20 percent of the ten thousand inhabitants of Holambra speak Dutch. Curious about the word...