Farmers’ market inspections try to root out unsafe food
June 18th, 2008
With tomato scare, farmers and market operators show concern
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
It all comes down to soil for John Paquin, a farmer who started Walnut Creek Organic Farm outside Rockne in 2000. His knowledge of soil biology helps him grow organic food, including tomatoes, free of food-borne illnesses.
“We have a microscope to look at soil samples to find the beneficial microbes,” Paquin says. He looks for the right combination of good microbes, bacteria, nematodes and fungi that indicate the soil is healthy and full of nutrients. The result is nutrient-rich produce that he sells through a Community Supported Agriculture program and at several farmers’ markets.
Suzanne Santos, director of the Sustainable Food Center in Austin, walks along dozens of rows in Paquin’s fields, checking out his crops and farming methods as part of a standard inspection her organization requires when a farm such as Walnut Creek wants to start selling at one of the center’s two Austin markets.
“We survey farms as they come in,” Santos says. “We do inspections if there’s something new like livestock or a crop. Also, say, if they get 200 layers, we want to see the chickens and how they maintain them.”
The Texas Certified Farmers’ Market Association requires markets to visit farms at least once, but each market decides what to inspect and what standards the farmers must meet.
A written complaint from another farmer or a customer will prompt inspection, usually when farmers are suspected of reselling produce, but that doesn’t happen often, Santos says. “It’s pretty obvious if someone needs a look,” if they are suspected of reselling. Only three farmers have been caught reselling produce in the past five years, and they were kicked out of the market, Santos says.
How Texas farms keep their products safe has become a critical issue in recent weeks as the number of salmonella cases caused by contaminated tomatoes rises.
The afternoon sun blazing overhead, Santos peers out from underneath the brim of her hat, counting the number of plants in each row to calculate how much of each crop Paquin is growing. There are 8,000 to 10,000 tomato plants on his 48-acre farm.
As she makes her way down the field, she picks up containers and inspects the labels, verifying that he’s using organic fertilizer and fungicide. She walks past boxes of tomatoes waiting in the shade for a worker to transport to the cooling area, where they will wait until being sold at a Saturday market two days later.
Instead of manure compost, which is made from turkey, chicken or even bat guano and increases the risk for soil disease, Paquin uses fish oil, fish emulsion and seaweed for fertilizers, not to feed the plants but to feed what’s in the soil.
“We take all our greenhouse clippings and add our dead plants to it, then add water. It’s got all the micronutrients in it already,” he says. “We’re just recycling what we’ve got here.”
Because Paquin doesn’t use manure compost, “our only concern for something like salmonella would be laborers’ involvement with chickens and not washing their hands,” Santos says.
After combing the field, she makes her way to check out the chicken roost, where several dozen birds peck on tomatoes strewn across the ground. “They love tomatoes,” says Santos, who keeps layers herself. “And look!” she says as she points to material concealing some of the chickens. “I’ve never seen one with a privacy curtain” for the egg-laying chickens. “Very nice. They like their privacy.”
Santos is joined on her inspection tour by Austin Farmers’ Market Association President Sonny Naegelin, a fourth-generation farmer from San Antonio. She talks with Paquin on the phone after they’ve finished most of the inspection. She wants to know where he gets his seed from, how he rotates his crops and a brief history of the farm.