So, this was a banner year for apples in the northeast, at least. The word comes from just about everyone I have chatted with, but would like to hear what folks have to say about this and see it corroborated.
My real reason for asking is how it panned out in terms of income. In our neck of the woods, as anticipated, it meant a glut, even of organic fruit. The general glut means all yards have plenty for use, conventional fruit prices are dirt cheap, and of course organic "outlets" are very limited. Now, it is great to have abundance, and it is also great to see those growing their own fruit wreaking the benefits of good work, so I welcome it in general. What is apparent, I think, and I have repeated this many times, is that the so-called market for healthier and sustainably produced fruit is a whole lot smaller than all the magazine articles postulate. On farm sales and farmers' markets don't cut it for most folks. In our area there are a handful of co-ops that pay well for fruit, but help support only a few growers at best.
In many rural communities more and more young people...and old... are turning to farming, including fruit growing. This is awesome. It does mean, however, that the market "pie" gets sliced into smaller and smaller pieces. The collective farming community, then will have to work together to increase the size of the pie if we all want to continue the venture.
We are in a very positive trend I think, better than in a long long time. Attitudes on health and care of the planet, especially with the younger generation is truly inspiring. The proportion of support of this notion, in terms of dollars spent, however, is meager. Yes, organic sales are up, some years with over a 10 percent increase, but do you know what the percentage of organic is of US food sales overall? Four. That's 4. That means that Americans purchase 96 percent of their food as conventional. The "pie" then is 4 percent, most of which is shipped in as California and overseas large scale production. Our local small stores and coops ship in produce from long distances during our own growing season, making the pie even smaller. Certainly with more new farmers entering the market, and homesteaders producing their own food (we encourage and promote this as a nursery ourselves), the trend will be a tougher and tougher market. Unless. Unless we can get more people to say, drink cider over Red Bull and Pepsi maybe. If even a quarter of the population ate food from organic or small farms, man, that would be a life-saver for us folks working in the dirt.
This is in the Healthy Harvest section, so back to topic. We had the biggest crop ever, in Walden, Vt. We sold what we could, pressed a lot of cider, and sold what we could of that. We also let approximately 10,000 pounds of harvested fruit go into the compost, the remainder we didn't even bother harvesting. To be sure, a lot is marketing naivety. Also, this story is common, and on a larger scale with anyone that has been long in the business. The take-home point is that along with success in growing better food, comes the job of getting more citizens to want that food, and at a respectable price. This is going to require a whole lot more organization than we have already. Working hard to produce a great product is one thing, but meaningless if it never sees a child's mouth. Healthy harvests are sweet, but an income is divine.
Walden Heights Nursery & OrchardZone 3 in Vermont