Green Tomatoes
Dear CSA Members,
All around our orchard is land planted in corn, tomatoes, and this year, garlic. We are accustomed to the small cannery tomato plants, the helicopter sprays, and the dust the tractors kick up. During tomato harvest, about 1 1⁄2 weeks, the sound of the picking/packing platforms that sound like a squeaky, rusty wheel run all through the night.
Last week, we noticed something different about the tomato harvest; they were picking them green. Instead of harvesting at night, mechanically, they are pick- ing by hand into picking totes and then dumping them into large gondolas, pulled by a semi, about 25 feet long and 4 feet deep that holds 25 tons of toma- toes. The tomatoes will be sent to a holding facility where they will be held in CA (controlled atmosphere) storage. Controlled atmosphere manages ethylene production and the amount of carbon dioxide and oxygen the fruit is exposed to. There, they will be ripened for about 2 weeks and when ready, packed and sold to the fresh market (at a very low price). Imagine all the resources and money involved in bringing a fresh tomato to market in this system! The trucking, the labor, the fuel and electricity! Even though this process goes against what I believe about how food should be grown and distributed, I also have to admit that I marvel at it. The goals of this factory farming system are to maximize profits for retailers, wholesalers, proces- sors and farmers. Scientists have figured out how to accomplish that by devel- oping a tomato variety which can be picked green and hard, then handled with mechanical systems delivering to stores a red tomato. The color red is hard- wired into humans’ brain, flavor and sweetness. This is all very marvelous but not very good for the environment or our health. The unknowledgeable consumer gets a tomato lacking in flavor, but especially lacking in nutrition. The environmental costs of industrial farming are not cal- culated, but hidden. In the end soils are depleted and yet more CO2 emissions are released into our atmosphere contributing to global warming. This system was designed to distribute food to people in densely populated urban areas who have no access to soil or to farms. As a CSA member you are rejecting that system and supporting our efforts to grow great tasting fruit, while building a healthy soil, and sequestering carbon. A win-win