Category Archives: Sustainability

Sustainability, Water

Power Play

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A while back we found out that we could generate 75 kilowatt-hours of electricity from a flume on our property. That’s enough electricity to power 15 refrigerated 40-foot Matson containers continuously.

Ever since then, we’ve been asking ourselves, “What does free electricity mean?” “What could we do with all that free electricity?” (Keeping in mind that we also have 6 million gallons of water per day that the sugar company had in its water system.)

We’re thinking wildly right now, and not worrying about the practicality of our ideas at this point. We just want to have fun with it. So here are some thoughts. Feel free to send us your ideas as well; we’d love to hear them.

We could have countless types and numbers of water fountains. After all, we are located just a few miles outside of Hilo, where we measure rain in feet, not inches, per year. There is approximately 10 feet of rain annually.

What about bug lights to control moths?

Could we simulate the seasons and fool plants into producing off-season? My friend Ralph, who lives in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, wonders if we couldn’t grow peonies. What are peonies? What about grapes? Or berries? ‘Ohelo?

And then there is the idea of aquaculture. Could we add salt and minerals to the water and simulate an ocean? Circulate the water through a filter? Or what if we grew freshwater prawns and fed them lettuce leaves or tomato leaves or bananas? The best bait is coconut. Maybe we run water from the prawn tanks through watercress beds and pump it back around?

What about taro lo‘i, where we use the same water by pumping the water back uphill and spraying it back in, oxygenating it at the same time?

Kevin Hopkins, director of the aquaculture center in Keaukaha, mentioned growing sturgeon. He asked how much free-flowing water we have. Could we install aerators?

Someone told me a funny sturgeon story recently. Sturgeons are associated with caviar. You know, the ultra, high-end caviar from the Caspian Sea. Well, a person who was growing sturgeons lost them in a flood. So when he found a few of them he knew he had to try to salvage the eggs.

He went to a high-end restaurant at one of the Kohala Coast resorts and asked the Executive Chef if he was interested in buying some caviar. The chef, assuming the man was a food purveyor, asked him where the caviar came from. He was thinking Caspian Sea.

The fish farmer replied, “Hilo.”

Comment here, or email me, with your ideas of what we should do with our free electricity!

Big Island, Sustainability

Hawaii Whole System Project

Richard recently showed me a really interesting report called The Hawaii Whole System Project.

This 84-page report, prepared by the Rocky Mountain Institute, was sponsored by the Omidyar family.

To wander away from my subject for just a moment: I was curious as to why the Omidyar family is interested in Hawai‘i and put its money into this in-depth look at agriculture on the Big Island, so I poked around the web a little.

It turns out that eBay founder Pierre Omidyar has a connection to Hawai‘i—he attended Punahou School and was recently named to its Board of Trustees. A quick Google search finds an interesting interview with him from when he was inducted into the Academy of Achievement and also that the philanthropist is one of Newsweek’s 15 People Who Make America Great.

“Business can be a force for good,” he says in that article. “You can make the world a better place and make money at the same time.” It sounds a lot like our hero Richard Ha, doesn’t it?

(You wouldn’t believe how much energy I have to expend, getting Richard to allow me to say things like that about him on his blog.)

From the report itself:

The Hawaii Whole System Project is a research and action project conducted by Rocky Mountain Institute on behalf of the Omidyar family. The Omidyar Family is pleased to sponsor this project to promote innovative, long-term planning and local self-reliance.

With the underlying assumption that local food and agriculture can be good for a community (expanded upon below), the goal of the first phase of this project, the phase contained in this document, is to understand the agricultural system on the Island of Hawaii in order to:

I. Identify the reasons why locally produced food holds such a small market share (about 85 percent of locally consumed food is imported according to several sources),

II. Define the barriers to increasing local market share and strengthening agriculture,

III. Locate leverage points that, when targeted with time or investment, could have multiple positive effects on local food and agriculture, and

IV. Identify business or non-profit opportunities that could activate these leverage points.

In order to identify the barriers to more local production and consumption, Phase I of the project focused on mapping the Hawaiian agriculture and food system. The research for Phase I consisted of gathering and studying published academic and government documents and analyzing agriculture and local food statistics from diverse sources, as well as interviewing people from up and down the food and agriculture value chain, from farmer to consumer, in order to understand the whole system, how it interacts with other systems such as energy, and how to influence it.

In Phase II, based on this preliminary research, the RMI team will analyze the feasibility of the opportunities. Finally in Phase III, the RMI team will work with The Kohala Center and other partners to bring together potential entrepreneurs and investors, as well as other people who might have an interest in local food and agriculture in order to act on the research findings.

It’s coming at us from all sides now – this interest in Hawai‘i’s sustainability and food security; this certainty that Hawai‘i doesn’t HAVE to import what the Whole System Project says is now 85 percent of its food.

In October, Richard will speak on these subjects at a food summit conference called Hawai‘i Island Food Summit: Our Food, Our Community, Our Future. It will be held October 5th and 5th at the Sheraton Keauhou Bay Hotel.

This two-day Summit will explore the visions, possibilities, ideas, and practical solutions to answering the question “How can Hawai’i Feed Itself?” We hope this conference will be a catalyst not only for changes in policy and practice at the island level, but a convening of the agricultural community to create a compelling vision for the future of food and farming across the state.

We’ll tell you more about all this as it comes up. You know we will.

Company News, Eating Locally, Food Security, Sustainability, Water

The Law of Survival

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As I’ve written before, I am increasingly worried about the fact that more than 70 percent of our food here in Hawai‘i is imported.

Recently, in the Hawai‘i Tribune-Herald, someone wrote that the Law of Comparative Advantage dictates that whenever we can purchase goods cheaper outside of Hawai‘i, we should. I majored in business, so I am aware of this law.

But first and foremost I am a survivor, and the Law of Survival is to “Always keep your options open.” And in order to keep our options open, we need to produce MORE food locally, not less.

The Law of Comparative Advantage is an intellectual exercise. The Law of Survival is, well, “the law of survival.”

And so this is our Law of Survival plan:

Hamakua Springs Country Farms is in the process of developing a hydroelectric plant. We will utilize water from a flume on our property, and then use that free electricity to replace that of the public utility. With our excess electricity, we plan to replace diesel- and gas motor-driven machinery with electric-driven vehicles. We also plan to use electric, motor-driven conveyors and other such labor-saving devices.

Then—by offering cheap electricity and cheap water, which we also have in absolute abundance—we are working on teaming up with farmers who specialize in products we do not.

We can offer technical expertise, in terms of disease and pest control, as well as technical and structural help in obtaining food safety certifications. And if these farmers meet our high standards, they can market their products with us under the Hamakua Springs brand.

In addition, we have a parcel of land on the highway where our farmer-partners will be able to sell their products in a farmers’ market-type setting.

We are actively working on these aspects of our “Law of Survival” in order to make our islands more sustainable in terms of food production.

In the State of Hawai‘i, what we need is for farmers to produce food on all islands at all elevations, both on the wet side of the island and the dry side. We need farmers to work together so that the whole is stronger than the sum of the parts.

We need to overcome the inertia of “it’s always been done this way.” And we need legislators to help us so we can act upon the Law of Survival, rather than intellectualize about the Law of Comparative Advantage.

Community, Eating Locally, Sustainability, Tomatoes

Upcountry

I am exercising and it’s going okay, but I’m not losing much weight right now. My resting heart rate is at 60 beats per minute, so that is going in the right direction. But regarding weight, I’ve hit some sort of plateau. I’ll let you know when I figure out a way out of it.

June and I just attended the second event of the Foodland Island Grown Market series. This time it was held at the Pukalani Foodland, part way up the slopes of Haleakala on Maui.

There were farmers there with lettuce and herbs, broccoli and cabbage, flowers from Maui and watermelon from O‘ahu. From the Big Island, there were Hamakua mushrooms and fresh fish and also us, with our tomatoes, bananas and living lettuce.

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Chef Keoni Chang with the owners of Waipouli Hydroponics.

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Fresh fish from Hilo

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The parakeet lady with some of our heirloom tomatoes

The people who came were very vocal about their support of local produce. They were knowledgeable and passionate about food security. They made a point of telling us how much they appreciate fresh produce grown in Hawaii.

And they came to buy. They bought every heirloom tomato we had, even those in the display. The tomatoes-on-the-vine went first. People bought all our cocktail tomatoes, as well as all the beef tomatoes in the clamshells.

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Chef Kent explaining how he used our cocktail tomatoes in his watercress/tomato dish, “and you have to try the Striped German heirlooms.”

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Armstrong Produce’s Tish Uehara, to Chef Keoni: “So that’s the trick? Ponzu sauce and togarashi?”

It was great to hear people say that they support local farmers. This was not just making polite conversation; they meant it. Sustainability and food security are big in Pukalani. All the farmers really enjoyed this event.

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Mark Teruya, President of Armstrong Produce, making sure everyone has a Foodland tote bag.

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Tiffany Tom, a buyer for Foodland Produce, finally taking a break because everything is going great

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Chef Keoni discussing the finer points of selecting a watermelon

And speaking of watermelon…

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Before they started, the little girl told the M.C.: “I’m going for the win!” She had such a great attitude it didn’t even matter who won!

Biofuel, Current Affairs, History, Sustainability

Biofuel

Nancy Redfeather, a friend and sustainable farming advocate in Kona, sent me a link to this article in the Maui News.

When I was on Maui recently, I attended a biofuel meeting sponsored by Hawaii Electric Light Company. The article quoted me as being one of the few testifying in favor of the plan to replace fossil fuel diesel with bio diesel, made from palm oil.

I thought I’d share my response to Nancy, in order to give a little bit of context to my testimony:

Hi Nancy:

Thanks for sending me this.

I was on Maui visiting supermarkets and wholesalers when I attended that biodiesel meeting. That was the fourth bioenergy meeting I had attended.

I believe we need to figure out how the Big Island can become sustainable in energy, as well as in food production. We are in the process of building a hydroelectric plant at the farm. That will allow us to get off the grid.

HECO says it is committed to sourcing only palm oil that is certified sustainable. Some people seemed skeptical and even disappointed that NRDC was trying to do a third-party certification program for palm oil farming.

Since, in 1993, our farm—Kea’au Banana Plantation—was the first banana farm in the world to be certified ECO O.K. by the Rainforest Alliance, I related our experience with what happened as a result of the certification program.

During the early 1990s, the Central/South American banana industry was notorious for its poor sustainable/environmental/worker health record. As a result, the Rainforest Alliance, headquartered in New York City, decided to start a certification program. We read about it when a friend on the mainland, who knew our sustainable farming philosophy, sent me a copy of the World Watch magazine, in which the planned banana certification program was described.

We looked at the protocol and saw that we were not far from what they required. So I called the Rainforest Alliance and told them what we were doing. They sent two inspectors from their San Jose, Costa Rica office to inspect us. They were amazed that a banana farm in Hawai‘i, of all places, was pretty much in compliance. The inspectors told me they were getting stiff resistance from the large banana companies in Central America.

To make a long story short, their Board met and we passed. But I was told that there was consternation in Central America, and that it would not do to have a foreign company become the first banana company in the world to be certified ECO O.K. So a few weeks went by until they found a small grower in Costa Rica who could qualify. Then we were both allowed to say we were first in the world.

The result was that other farms started to transform themselves so they could be certified ECO O.K. In a short time it became clear that, because of marketing pressure, the large banana companies could no longer resist—and they started to clean up their acts.

On Maui, I related how our company was instrumental in changing the behavior of the world’s banana industry because of the Rainforest Alliance’s third party certification program. I told everyone that I felt that NRDC was trying to achieve the same thing—transform palm oil production behavior worldwide—and that I had actually seen it work.

But it seems clear to me that this is a complex issue on Maui.

Anyway, that is the story behind the story.

Community, Sustainability

Whole Foods

Whole Foods Market, the world’s leading retailer of natural and organic foods, which has 195 stores in North America and the United Kingdom, has announced that it is opening stores in Hawai‘i. And its website, describing the company’s corporate values, seems to be in line with what we want for Hawai‘i. But I worry that the company may not really understand what it means to be located on islands in the middle of the ocean.

I think that the company’s benefit to life in Hawai‘i will be determined by whether or not it is a positive force in helping Hawaii become a food-sustainable society. In other words, will it support local farmers in a way that increases locally produced food?

We are the most isolated place in the world. If shipping is interrupted for a long time we are doomed. Will Whole Foods help Hawai‘i to become more food secure?

I can point to two supermarkets who have made a major difference in supporting local food producers. Although they also help many other local producers, I can use our own experiences to demonstrate what they do.

Several years ago, Jenai Walls, President of Foodland Supermarkets, and Abel Porter, its Chief Operating Officer, visited our farm. They let us know that it was their personal intent to support local farmers and to support us as we developed our farm business. Soon after, they invited June and me to lunch on O‘ahu to reinforce that commitment.

Subsequently, Jenai wrote a very strong letter in support of our application for a Rural Economic Transition Assistance Hawaii grant. This grant assists businesses in transitioning from a sugar-based economy to a diversified one. That grant was very important in the development of our hydroponic farm operations and I’m sure Jenai’s letter of support was instrumental in our obtaining it.

Recently Foodland Supermarket agreed to help us by marketing our excess bananas during the seasonal high point. This was very significant because if we were had not been able to sell our bananas during that period, we would have been forced to take them out of production, which would have caused a shortage during the next winter period. Because Foodland supported us during such a critical period, we will have adequate volume of bananas next winter.

Foodland’s support allows us to continue to grow our farm business. This is much more than just talk, and demonstrates real support for local agriculture.

Abel Porter, the company’s COO, visited us again last month. He wanted to see how our hydroponic operation was progressing and also to continue to demonstrate Foodland’s commitment to supporting locally grown produce. We showed him some new products in development. He thought some had potential and we will be working with Foodland to bring those products to market.

KTA Superstores is another local market that makes an extra effort to support local suppliers. Its company brand is called Mountain Apple. KTA makes a special effort to source local products. They are always game to try something new.

We have been fortunate over the years because KTA works very closely with us in product development. They advise us on what kind of packaging might work and then give us real time feedback. This gives us a great opportunity to see what works and what does not. KTA has helped us, in a real way, since we first produced bananas more than 30 years ago.

Recently we took a mainland trip with Derek Kurisu, KTA’s legendary Vice President of Operations. He showed us how some of the Napa Valley wine operators market their products. He took us to see how value-added salad dressing was manufactured—the kind one finds in the Williams Sonoma catalog. And we saw how value-added fresh cut fruit is packaged and processed. This was a very valuable, educational experience.

From our perspective, Foodland Supermarkets and KTA Superstores do a lot to help Hawai‘i become self-sufficient in terms of food. It’s a complex issue, but both of these companies do more than most to try to make this work.

We’ll see what happens when Whole Foods enters our Hawai‘i market. I am hopeful it will be a positive for our local farmers and other food producers. I’ll revisit this subject here on the blog after they’ve been in Hawai‘i awhile and we can see how things are unfolding.

Sustainability, Water

Water, Water, Everywhere

Richard Ha writes:

When we made the decision nearly 12 years ago to diversify geographically from our main farm in Kea‘au, the most important factor for us was sustainability. We could have chosen to locate on O‘ahu, which was close to the market. Most of Hawai‘i’s customers live there, and many people advised us to move there.

We chose Pepe‘ekeo, instead, for reasons of sustainability. One of the most important factors was the abundance of available water. Annual rainfall here is in the neighborhood of 140 inches. There are four streams and three springs that run through our property, which are all potential sources of irrigation water.

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Today we are working on transforming this enormous quantity of water into electricity. At the highest-elevation corner of our property there is a flume intake, which used to channel water down to the Hilo Coast Processing Plant (the sugar mill that serviced the Pepe‘ekeo area). The flume runs from our property’s highest elevation to its lowest point. We want to generate electricity and then route the water back into the flume channel when we are done with it.

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An inspector from the Commission on Water Resource Management (CWRM) came to inspect the flume site last week. We want to make sure that we develop this project in the right way, so we did not start any work before finding out exactly what is allowed. As it turns out, this flume intake is an approved use that is recorded with the CWRM. We were told that as long as we do nothing to the stream itself we can use its water to generate electricity. We are elated.

A preliminary estimate is that we can run all our reefers and all our other electrical motors and still have a lot of leftover electricity to sell back to HELCO.

Because we based the decision to locate our new farm around sustainability issues, we are now in a position to generate our own, free, electricity. Sustainability is one of our core values and it has guided our actions for a number of years.

Government, Seal of Quality, Sustainability

Seal of Quality

Richard Ha wrote:

Our farm is one of 12 founding members of Hawai‘i’s “Seal of Quality” program, which includes some of the state’s most progressive farmers in partnership with seven of its highest profile chefs.

After nine months, we now have 26 farmers in the Seal of Quality program and more are coming on board.

This Department of Agriculture program aims to brand high quality, locally grown products in such a way that farming in Hawai‘i is a sustainable occupation.

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Founding farmers, at a luncheon with Governor Lingle to kick off the Seal of Quality program

That’s a pretty heavy concept. And it’s one that all the farmers involved are taking pretty seriously.

I attended a meeting recently of the 12 founding members, all farmers. I looked around the conference room at the Department of Agriculture on O‘ahu and it struck me, hard, that this is a group of “do-ers.” Each is successful in his or her own right and I have tremendous respect for each one.

It’s a group of dynamic entrepreneurs and some synergy is starting to happen. None of those people had to be there at that meeting. They were only there because they considered there to be some real benefit to being there.

The Seal of Quality members are feeling like this might be the start of something really important and big.

To give some history on this Seal of Quality program, let me tell you a story.

Many years ago, when “Hawai‘i Regional Cuisine” chefs were just starting out, chefs over in Kohala, like Peter Merriman and Alan Wong, couldn’t get fresh produce locally. They had to import produce from the mainland.

The chefs made it known that they would pay well for fresh produce grown locally. They encouraged local farmers to start growing specifically for them, and to just come to the back door where they would pay them directly. That was pretty revolutionary at the time, and it was the start of Hawai‘i Regional Cuisine.

So what was being grown locally started being diverted to the chefs. Farmers started making more money and so they could afford to grow their businesses. What was happening gave farmers hope that they could produce a good quality product and be sustainable.

At that time I heard that Peter Merriman, who was working at one of the Kohala Coast resorts, said, “I’d like to see one of my farmers drive up in a Mercedes Benz.”

What was happening over there didn’t affect me at the time, as I was growing bananas on the other side of the island in Hilo. Peter probably had no idea who I was. But I was so impressed by his statement and what it represented that I called Peter at home and thanked him on behalf of farmers everywhere. We both remember that day many years ago.

If you fast-forward 15 years, now there’s a market for fresh local produce, and a big movement to support local produce—and it’s driven by those same Hawai‘i Regional Cuisine chefs. Are there farmers driving Mercedes? I don’t know! What I do know is that the Hawai‘i Regional Cuisine chefs have changed the way we eat as well as how consumers perceive locally grown products.

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Lani Weigert, co-owner & marketing director, Ali‘i Kula Lavender; Governor Linda Lingle; Lieutenant Governor Duke Aiona; Speaker of the House Calvin Say

And now, 15 years later, seven of those top Hawai‘i Regional Chefs are officially partnering with and supporting this group of Seal of Quality farmers, as they have supported so many farmers since those early days.

Maybe ten years ago, Chef Sam Choy did a free cooking demonstration at the Pearl Harbor Commissary with us. Our grandson was walking around in a banana suit then. (Recently, the military buyer there asked me to have our grandson wear the banana outfit again. I told her that Kapono was 4 feet tall then; he is 6 feet tall now. I don’t think he is into banana costumes any more.)

Roy Yamaguchi did a segment on our banana farm for his cooking show more than 10 years ago, and our picture and a description of what we do appear in his cookbook. He has done similar things for many other farmers.

And Chef Alan Wong recently invited several Seal of Quality members to attend his birthday party, where contestants from Top Chef, the country’s top-rated reality cooking show, prepared the food as the show’s semi-final competition. An estimated two million viewers across America saw the farmers on TV.

The Seal of Quality group was also invited to bring its products to the Top Chef final competition—the program’s finale, aired a week later—which taped in Kona at the Hilton Waikoloa, and where Chef Roy Yamaguchi was a guest judge. I represented the Seal of Quality producers who could not attend at a mock “farmer’s market,” where the contestants sampled and selected ingredients for their final competitions. Other Seal of Quality members set up their own displays.

As the Hawai‘i Regional Cuisine chefs profoundly changed the way we eat, this partnership between the chefs and Seal of Quality farmers has the potential to change the way Hawai‘i farms.
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The very high-profile chefs use our products when they make their presentations to their guests. What they are doing is giving us a venue to show off our products, which adds a lot of value to our products.

And the effect of that is it makes farming sustainable.

What do I mean by "sustainable?" People say that the next generation doesn’t want to farm. But I believe the next generation would be more than willing to farm if they saw a vision for the future that was profitable.

A lot of our vision for farming goes beyond the traditional fertilizing of the plant and harvesting the fruit. The next generation is looking for something exciting—and watching plants grow is not exciting. We’ve got to stretch their imaginations; give them hope and things to look forward to. This is what will pull the next generation along, and this, I think, is the biggest benefit of the Seal of Quality program.

 

When I look around at the founding Seal of Quality members, most run family farms with children who are actively involved in the company. These farmers’ children see their parents’ vision for the future. They have learned that it’s possible to shape that future and also be profitable and successful.

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Dean Okimoto of Nalo Farms; Rep. Ryan Yamane, Chairperson of the House Tourism Committee; Speaker of the House Calvin Say; Dr. Cal and Kay Lum, North Shore Cattle Company.

We Seal of Quality members are also trying to make decisions for our mutual benefit. For instance, one of the Seal of Quality members is Jim Reddekopp, who owns the Hawaiian Vanilla Company. In addition to farming he organizes farm tours, and recently he asked if we would host a group of 20 people at Hamakua Springs for an hour. I would normally have declined, just due to the logistics of it, but because he’s a Seal of Quality member, I said sure. I would make similar decisions for other members, too, as the opportunity arises.

Building alliances is another tool that will help agriculture in the future.

What is the Seal of Quality exactly? On one level, it’s a sticker.

Seal of Quality products are, by definition, “Genuine, Hawaii Grown, Hawaii Made, Premium Products.”

I’ve heard that tourists from Japan are told about the Seal of Quality label and they look for it. When they see a product that doesn’t have the label, they think it must be off grade or something. So the message is getting out. I’m realizing we cannot get lazy and forget to label any of our products!

We’ve had labeling programs before that started out standing for quality, but you’re only as strong as your weakest link. In the Seal of Quality program, we don’t have any weak links.

Together, the Seal of Quality farmers can influence consumers to purchase locally grown products instead of imported ones. They can also influence decision makers on important issues concerning Hawai‘i agriculture.

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Richard and June Ha of Hamakua Springs Country Farms; Eric Tanouye of Green Point Nurseries; Clifton Tsuji, Chair of the House Agriculture committee

It’s a program our legislators should support as they work to make Hawai‘i agriculture sustainable into the future. A bill in the legislature right now would deposit the proceeds from Seal of Quality labels into a special fund, rather than have them go into the general fund. This will allow the program to use those funds for advertising and marketing activities, and to draw down federal matching funds. They will be monies from members, to members, and for members – A self-sufficiency concept.

Most importantly, it would allow the program to plan long term. Monies would likely be available consistently, in good times as well as tougher ones, which is precisely when targeted marketing is important. In other words, it will allow the Seal of Quality program to operate like a business.

The Seal of Quality stands for quality, and we plan to maintain and defend that quality.

Click here for a list of the founding Seal of Quality farmers and chefs.

How We Do It, Sustainability, Tomatoes

Pretty Ripe

Richard Ha writes:

I’ve said before that “industrial agriculture” has many shortcomings, and a New York Times article that ran this week illustrates some of them.

The article laments that conventional tomatoes are bred to withstand the rigors of the supply chain and other issues farmers face, with good taste being only an afterthought.

It talks about an unconventional tomato called “Ugly Ripe” that tastes good and is available during the winter. The problem? It’s grown using the ozone-depleting chemical methyl bromide, which kills weed seeds and controls a root-damaging insect. The article says that despite the Ugly Ripe’s good taste, it’s not sustainable because it’s grown using methyl bromide.

By contrast, here at Hamakua Springs we grow tomatoes that taste good year round. And we don’t use ozone-depleting chemicals.

Our tomatoes taste good because we very specifically select varieties for taste over any other quality. We harvest when the fruit is vine ripe, which means complex flavors have already developed. We used weed cloth, so we don’t have to spray weeds. Because our operation is hydroponic—soil-free—we don’t have soil-borne insects. All this adds up to good taste and zero need for ozone-depleting methyl bromide.

When the television program Top Chef taped on the Big Island in December, finalist Marcel Vigneron tasted one of our Hamakua Springs tomatoes while selecting ingredients for the final competitions and immediately loaded up his basket. And one of the show’s chef consultants took some tomatoes with her to eat, saying offhandedly that there were no good tomatoes during the winter where she lives. Amazing.

We were also pleased when our Hamakua Springs cocktail tomatoes were selected in a taste test as “best tomato” by 100 master chefs and culinary students during Lynne Rosetto Kasper’s Tomato 101 seminar in Honolulu. That was just last month—also in the winter.

Good tasting AND sustainable both! We must be doing something right.

Alan Wong, Company News, Sustainability

Kids in a Candy Store

When The Hualalai Grille by Alan Wong, over in Kohala, was closed for renovations last week, Alan Wong brought his staff over for a tour of the farm.

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Charlotte, Alan and Richard in the tomatoes

Richard said he always enjoys showing and explaining all that goes into making our produce so flavorful, safe and consistent. This visit also gave him a chance to tell the people working at the Hualalai Grille how much their support means to us here at the farm, and how it helps keep local farming a sustainable occupation.

“When they present our products in the best light possible, as they do,” he explained, “it raises the reputation of our product in the retail trade. And this helps us to price our products so we can be sustainable.

“I don’t think they had thought much about how much their support helps local farmers.”

Charlotte Romo, the farm’s hydroponic crop specialist, helped with the farm tour. “We showed them our little round yellow cucumber,” she said. “It was our first one; we’d just harvested it. They’re like tennis balls.”

“One of the first things Richard did when Alan came,” she said, “was to give him two seed catalogs so he could go through them and think about all the fun things we can grow.” She said the three of them are like kids in a candy shop with all the possibilities they find in seed catalogs.

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Alan Wong in action

One thing the chefs and other staff members got to see was our new Variety Garden, where we grow a lot of vegetables in close collaboration with Chef Alan.

The Variety Garden has purple carrots, golden beets, colored radishes, different colors and shapes of sweet bell peppers, numerous varieties, colors and shapes of eggplants, at least 15 varieties of heirloom tomatoes, poha and tomatillos and even more.

Charlotte described the samples they set up in the packing house for the group to taste. “Tracy put out some of the new stuff we’re growing,” she said, “and a selection of the heirlooms and the Hamakua Sweets (tomatoes). Alan was eating a melon. We have started growing some really sweet, good melons, and we send him a few at a time.”

She said Alan is passionate about his produce. “He gets really excited,” she said, “which is nice for us because we don’t usually see that. I mostly work with plants, and pruners, so it’s fun to see somebody who appreciates it.”

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Charlotte and Tracy, briefing the troops

She said he also asks a lot of really good questions. “He had me stumped at one point,” she said, “and I was embarrassed because I’m pretty knowledgeable about tomatoes. He asked if I knew the compound responsible for the smell of the vine. You know how with the T.O.V.’s, the Tomatoes-on-the-Vine, you can smell that very strong aroma of the vine, and that’s how you know it’s so fresh? I didn’t know the answer.

“So I called up one of my old professors,” she said. “She’s one of the top tomato physiologists, and she didn’t know either. It’s actually a bunch of compounds. I sent him some more information about it.”

She explained that most of the new products we grow for Chef Alan Wong are experimental at this point, while we perfect how to grow them. “We like to try new and different things,” she said. “It’s fun for us. Hopefully in the future these veggies will be in the stores at some point. That’s the whole idea—to provide more local, sustainable food instead of having to have everything shipped here.” – Leslie Lang