MARCH 2012
CELEBRATING 132 YEARS AS CANADA’S PREMIER HORTICULTURAL PUBLICATION
VOLUME 62 NUMBER 03
Why the greenhouse vegetable sector is ripe for expansion KAREN DAVIDSON While the nightly economic news suggests an umbrella, the Canadian greenhouse vegetable sector forecasts sunshine. A dollar at par, or higher, doesn’t rain on the produce parade, even with 70 per cent production going to the U.S. In Ontario, for example, 2011 was a banner year, with 203 growers adding 148 acres of production for a total tally of 2,047 acres. Rounding up numbers, that’s about $750,000 investment per acre. To put the sector into perspective, the American industry has half the size at just 1083 acres, according to Glen Snoek, market and economic policy analyst, Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers, citing a 2009 USDA survey. What’s driving the expansion? Opportunities abound in the U.S. where field-grown produce is being replaced by the consistent quality and taste of greenhouse produce. Seedless cucumbers, a relative novelty, still have plenty of upward momentum not only for grocers but for foodservice. There’s a host of reasons for any individual operator, but a key factor is low interest rates. Heating, the largest cost of greenhouses, is priced relatively low compared to recent years. “All operating costs, with the exception of labour, are stable,” explains Peter Quiring, principal, Nature Fresh Farms, Leamington,
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Special: Ontario Fruit and Vegetable Convention Section B
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Beverly Greenhouses near Waterdown, Ontario are expanding from 15 to 22 acres of seedless cucumbers this year, taking advantage of economies of scale to deal with declining margins. Jan VanderHout (pictured) and his brother Dale are following the industry trend. Last year, Ontario’s industry added 148 acres for a total tally of 2,067 acres in production. Photo by Denis Cahill.
Ontario. “But growth is really about the need to maintain market share. Mexico is growing uncontrollably, and we need to have a full roster of product to offer our customers.” Field tomatoes and more recently, shade-covered, fieldgrown tomatoes, predominantly from Mexico are encroaching on greenhouse vegetable sales. These tomatoes are not welcomed by the growers of controlled-environment greenhouse produce because they’re grown with pesticides and not always under integrated pesticide management. In the grocery aisles, there are no distinctions made between “shade-grown” and “greenhouse-grown” product. A North American Greenhouse/Hothouse Vegetable Growers group consisting of B.C.’s Houweling Nurseries Group, Windset Farms and Village Farms has tried to change that. To differentiate their products, they promote a precise definition for a greenhouse/hothouse with a third-party
certification program. But to the untrained eye, Mexican produce grown under shade cloth may appear to be the same quality with a lower price. And that’s exactly the competition that B.C. growers face when they market
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Mexico is growing uncontrollably, and we need to have a full roster of product to offer our customers.” ~ Peter Quiring, Nature Fresh Farms down the I-5 corridor, including Seattle, Portland and large California cities, says Tom Demma, general manager, British Columbia Vegetable Marketing Commission. They run straight into Mexican product moving north at the end of the fall and
right through the spring months. Spring is just when B.C. producers are at their prime with 690 acres on line. “Prices were good last year,” says Jan VanderHout, Beverly Greenhouses, who is currently expanding cucumber greenhouses at Waterdown, Ontario from 15 to 22 acres. “They’re stable this year, but when you look at pricing of product coming out of Mexico, there’s no way cost of production can be that low.” Here’s how Mexican company Agricola Pony is turning up the heat in Culiacan, in the northwestern province of Sinaloa. They have converted all of their openfield, roma tomato production to 108 acres of Cravo retractable roof shadehouses. These structures provide maximum cooling while transplanting in September, then shade the crop for harvest into June. Next, they have installed drip irrigation systems to boost yields and fruit size while reducing
water consumption. And, labour is plentiful and cheap. The conversion has been so successful that Agricola Pony is planning another expansion of the same magnitude. Their aggressive plans are due, in part, to a marketing partnership with Eagle Eye Produce, a leading grower and shipper of potatoes, onions, watermelons and vegetables with offices in Arizona, California, Idaho and Utah. According to its website, Eagle Eye Produce ships to supermarkets, wholesalers, food service distributors and wholesale clubs across the U.S. and Canada. Greenhouse growers in Canada are casting a wary eye. In late December 2011, a YouTube video from Eagle Eye Produce and Agricola Pony promoted their produce with fanfare: “They look like a greenhouse tomato but taste like garden-fresh.”
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