Vegetable Growers News

Company Building Baby Carrot Toehold in Ontario

While there’s plenty of challenge in growing and packaging baby carrots in Ontario, success for the five Streef brothers hinges on their ability to compete with imports. “When you walk into a grocery store, there’s just about anything you can imagine available from anywhere in the world. It just wasn’t like that 20 year ago,” Albert Streef said. California dominates baby carrots in North America. The two biggest players in the state – Bolthouse Farms and Grimmway Farms – each have plant investments running into the tens of millions and are set up to produce carrots year round, Streef said. The big companies don’t want slowdowns caused by competition from such seasonal, carrot-growing areas as Ontario. That’s why deals are struck to supply buyers for the whole year. For instance, one of Ontario’s major grocery chains, when dealing with a major baby carrot supplier, might be asked to…  » Read more

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Action Needed to Save Global Trade Talks

“Free trade,” wrote Richard Cobden in 1857, “is God’s diplomacy, and there is no more certain way of uniting people.” You can’t help wondering what he would have made of the Doha “development round” of world trade talks. After four years of what passes for negotiations, the scorecard for delivery remains a blank sheet. While the Group of Eight summit meeting in July marked a quantum shift in rich-country commitments to aid, when it comes to trade, inertia is the order of the day. The World Trade Organization’s (WTO) ministerial meeting in Hong Kong in December now represents high noon for the Doha round – and the odds on outright failure are shortening by the day. Such an outcome would be a disaster. Success in the Doha round would give a powerful impetus to global poverty reduction efforts. Improved access to markets and an end to unfair…  » Read more

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Straw ‘Tractor’ Hauls in Customers

Gro-Moore Farms claims to have the largest John Deere in North America. It’s about 18 feet tall and 30 feet long. An “unbelievable” number of people have taken pictures of it. There’s one drawback, however. It’s made of straw, said Jack Moore, one of the farm’s owners. Jack’s wife, Kathy, has painted straw bales for 20 years. They’re usually used as makeshift billboards for the farm market or crowd barriers for the festivals, then taken back to the farm and used as mulch cover for the berries. The designer was a little more ambitious this year. It took her a week and 10 gallons of paint to create the straw “tractor.” She’s quite the artist, Jack said. Gro-Moore Farms is located in Henrietta, N.Y., about 15 miles from Rochester. It’s a family business, run by Jack and Kathy; Jack’s parents, Janet and George Sr.; and Jack’s brother, George…  » Read more

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Pres. Bush Pitches Immigration Reform

President George Bush took to the stump in late November to urge Congress to cut through the Gordian knot of issues involving immigration, border security and the perceived needs of many American businesses for cheap, unskilled labor. The president’s basic approach hasn’t changed since he presented it almost two years ago, but the emphasis in his recent speeches was different. Talking tough, he attempted to mollify those in his conservative base who want stern measures on border security and equate efforts to legalize illegal immigrants to coddling lawbreakers. Bush proposed tough measures to defend the borders but more orderly ways to funnel immigrants into the country to do the menial work of picking produce, cooking in fast food restaurants and cleaning hotel rooms. United Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Association President Tom Stenzel recently praised the Washington Post for its reporting of an “impending labor crisis that…  » Read more

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