Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

market-farming - Re: [Market-farming] quality produce in California?

market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Market Farming

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: "Bill Shoemaker" <wshoemak AT inil.com>
  • To: "Market Farming" <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] quality produce in California?
  • Date: Wed, 19 Sep 2007 07:53:23 -0500

Sure, you're right. But I'm not trying to be critical of shuipping because it's shipping. I'm critical of the quality of produce most people generally have available to them. Many have few choices for sources of produce and the big box industry doesn't offer them much quality. I think it's a crisis. Why do Americans fail to respond to a major campaign by the produce industry to eat 5 servings of fruits and vegetables a day? The research shows they eat, on average, about 3 servings of fruits and vegetables a day. They don't eat more, because they don't like it. It's not very high quality. I eat produce at the rate of 8-10 servings a day during the season, when fresh product is litlerally at my doorstep. But when I don't have any local production, and I have to rely on the retail m,arkets that rely on shippers, product quality is so poor I rely more on our home-canned and frozen product, which very few people do any more. These retailers do not buy much from local sources. Some buy none. They have long-standing relationships with shippers who provide product 12 months/year. Those relationships are key to the system of cash-flow and profit. Local growers don't figure well into the system. So the consumer gets what the system offers. They have few, if any alternatives.
 
I'm not trying to be critical of shipping because it's shipping. I'm frustrated that consumers fail to eat much produce because they don't have access to really good, FRESH produce. The wholesale system is more about consistent supply of mediocre product than it is about working harder to provide quality product. I think everyone loses. Retailers sell less product and suffer more shrink. Consumers buy less product, enjoy it less and suffer less healthy lives. If they could the quality of product that we eat routinely from our farms and gardens, I think they'd eat more, but the system cuts out most produce growers in short-season areas.
 
By the way, mangoes are a recent introduction into Midwest produce departments. You didn't find them 15 years ago. My Puerto Rican friend tells me they are nothing like the ones he finds back home in Puerto Rico. I wish you could grow mangoes and sell them to your wholesale buyers too.
 
 
Bill
 
 
 
Bill, I agree with you, but at the same time I bet you are having a hard time growing mangos in Illinois. So some things need to be shipped.
I also do market farming and sell only to wholesale buyers. I harvest one day and they have it the next. Can't get much fresher than that. Bill
 



Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page