Category Archives: Best Of The Maldives

Maldives resort gardens are used for any sort of fresh veg and herbs the chef needs in his kitchen. But the record-breaking hydroponic garden at Le Meridien features a special treat with unparalleled variety – lettuce. It grows 6 different varieties of lettuce

• Green Coral
• Crystal lettuce
• Red Oak
• Mizuna
• Lollo Rosso
• Romaine (Baby Gem)

The resort describes their lettuce plantation process:

· “Lettuce is grown in three stages: Seed sowing, Transplanting, and Harvesting. Lettuce gets ready to harvest in 45 days. Before transplanting into main NFT channels the lettuce is in nursery stage which completes in 20 days, and then after transplant another 25 days.”

Lettuce entertain your palette!

• “At 430m2, The Greenhouse is one of the Maldives’ largest state-of-the-art hydroponic farms, purposely designed to promote sustainable farming and consumption. It serves as a blueprint for the resort’s food menus providing a physical link between the plate and Executive Chef’s mindset.”

Some resorts have gardens for the ultimate in low-mileage produce. Others have invested in sophisticated nurseries and infrastructure to expand their capability (not to mention tap into the Maldives biggest and free-est natural resource…sunshine). But Le Meridien sets a new bar for scale  (see the chart below which shows the gorwn stuff growing) and sophistication of local grown produce with its state-of-the-art hydroponic greenhouse:

• “Our greenhouse is semi-automatic with area around 500 m2 which can accommodate 7580 plants. We grow plants with hydroponic technique (NFT system) under controlled environment. We maintain air temperature below 30 degree Celsius using misting system, shade net and nutrient water temperature 24 degree Celsius using chiller. It’s a cyclic process, we do seed sowing and transplanting twice a week and harvesting every day. In our hydroponic system we use Albert solution (Nutrient A+B)  for proving nutrient to plants. Nutrient range is maintained 1.5 EC and pH -6. We do organic cultivation in our greenhouse, for controlling insects if any we use yellow/ blue sticky traps. We have rainwater harvesting system as well which accommodate 30k liters of water. Our production capacity is: 30kg/day.”

Le Meridien grows…

• Lettuce
• Green Coral
• Crystal lettuce
• Red Oak
• Mizuna
• Lollo Rosso
• Romaine (Baby Gem)
• Herbs
• Spearmint
• Peppermint
• Thai Basil
• Italian Basil
• Rosemary
• Thyme
• Parsley
• 
  
• Vegetables
• Bokchoy
• Asian Spinach
• Water Spinach