Let the flowers speak for themselves: Dutch to help tulips blossom in Pakistan again

Staff Report

LAHORE: Netherlands will help the Pakistan Horticulture Development and Export Board (PHDEB) bring the tulip back to Pakistan, said the Dutch ambassador, Dr Marcel Kurpershoek.

Tulip, seen as a flower typical to the Netherlands, is a bulbous plant that originally came from Turkey, Persia and Afghanistan, where it grew in the wild. The great Mogul emperor Babar was an expert on tulips and had counted 33 different varieties of the flower. According to a Persian legend, the first tulips sprang up from the blood shed by a lover and for a long time the tulip was the symbol of avowed and love.

“The Royal Netherlands Embassy will facilitate and sponsor a PHDEB delegation to visit the International Hortifair — the most important horticulture events in the world, to be held from November 3 to November 6 in Amsterdam,” Dr Kurpershoek said, while talking to a senior PHDEB official in Islamabad..

According to a press release, Dr Kurpershoek said he wished to share his country’s knowledge and expertise with Pakistan in the field of floriculture, as it could be “a better field for cooperation” between the two nations.

“I have handed over my credentials to President General Pervez Musharraf as ambassador to Pakistan”, he said. “But the true ambassadors of the Netherlands are the Dutch flowers, particularly, the tulip”, he said. “We have decided to let the flowers speak for themselves,” he said.

PHDEB Chairman Afaq Tiwana thanked the Dutch ambassador for his cooperation and for promoting ties between the two countries. He said the promotion of tulip’s growth in Pakistan was a good step. He called the exotic flower a symbol of love and friendship.

Shamoon Sadiq, PHDEB chief executive officer, congratulated Dr Kurpershoek and his wife, Betsy Udink Royal on holding a fabulous, unique and successful flora event last week in Islamabad. He said that he hoped the PHDEB delegation’s visit to Netherlands would provide an opportunity to Pakistani traders to meet Dutch companies officials and discuss the transfer of technologies and techniques and investment in Pakistan.

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