"I'm Proud to Eat What I Grow!"
VANCOUVER - Feb 18/13 - SNS -- Farmers are the first line of defense in making sure that the quality that is shipped to end users is suitable for their needs. That is one of the key messages in the recently published book, The 20-Month Year: The Farmer's Perspective.
Following is a brief excerpt from the book which discusses the need for farmers to proudly eat what they grow and for all market participants to maintain an open discussion about quality and their needs.
Food or Stones?
It is impossible to go a livestock convention and find a vegetarian who raises cattle, hogs or chickens. It is equally impossible to find a rancher who will not proudly eat the meat they produce. Go to the annual meetings of the provincial pulse grower associations and it is easy to find people who almost never eat pulses. If pea and lentil growers do not proudly eat what they grow, how will they know if they are growing food or vegetarian stones?
A farmer asked me how he would know if his peas were good enough to ship to India. I replied, "Ask your wife to cook them. If she won't, they're not good enough."
Sometimes, peas and lentils look good enough to eat, but they do not cook. This happened in 2010 with a shipment of Number 2 Canada large green lentils to Chile. The 2009 crop lentils were uniform in color and very nice in appearance, but there are several factors that affect cooking time. Older lentils cook more slowly than freshly harvested lentils, and smaller lentils cook faster than larger lentils. When growing conditions are hotter than normal, cooking times for lentils normally increase. Cooking time is not normally taken into account when lentils are being bred.
Most lentils imported by Latin America are sold directly to consumers in plastic or cellophane bags of up to one kilogram. Cooking time is critically important. If consumers discover that a certain brand of lentils or split peas do not cook in a reasonable time, they will ignore the brand, and that importer will think twice about buying from the companies that supplied the pulses, and possibly even the country.
Cooking time is also critically important to canners. This, along with concerns over cracked seed coats, has seen the dry edible bean industry develop two market streams for beans. Beans targeting the canning industry normally trade at a premium to beans going into the packaging industry. While both need to cook, canners have additional quality needs. Peas and lentils are not normally traded this way, but some buyers do require cooking tests. Grinders and millers do not need to worry about cooking time. Most of the peas sold to China are ground into flour to make noodles, or into a sweet paste for confectionary and dessert items. Some are deep fried. India grinds a fraction of every type of pulse eaten into flour. The fractionation trade is growing in size, with organizations such as pulse Canada working closely with the food manufacturing industry to see where protein, starch or fiber isolates from pulses add value to food products. They have already found a role in gluten-free foods and as additives to veggie burgers, nutritional bars, baked goods, pet foods and other products.
First Line of Defence
Farmers are the first line of defence in making sure pulses go into the right market. However, farmers cannot play their part if they do not eat what they grow. That is the only way they will know if their harvest can go to packagers and canners, or should be directed to grinders and fractionators. Processors are the next line of defence in making sure buyers receive the right quality of product. Exporters are the final line, having the responsibility to make sure the merchandise shipped not only meets their obligations under the contract, but meets the needs of the buyer. None of this is possible if people across the marketing chain do not talk to one another, do not share information, and do not cook and eat the pulses they trade or grow. Communication must occur for any industry to reach its full potential.
Documentation, responsibility and accountability are also vital. The dry edible bean industry was an early adopter of "identity preserved" or IP traceability. They are also used by Cargill for the export of the Intermountain canola variety to Japan; by General Mills for a variety of white wheat; DowAgro Sciences for Nexera canola exports to Japan; and Canada's dry edible bean industry for white bean exports to canners and food grade soybeans to Japan. To support their IP marketing programs, many companies are becoming HAACP certified. Some are starting to talk about the need for farmers to also become HAACP certified so that there is full traceability and documentation throughout the entire marketing chainfrom field to table. More importantly, this would make it easier for the correct quality to be shipped to millers, canners and packagers. This could become more important in destinations which also receive bulk conventional shipments, because it would guarantee niche market buyers that they are getting exactly what they need.
HAACP certification has already come to farms in North America. Programs to help vegetable and livestock producers become HAACP certified are supported by both industry and government.
#########################
The 20-Month Year: The Farmer's Perspective was just published. Though aimed at farmers, it contains useful information for all market participants. A key feature of the book are heat maps, which show how prices and movement evolve during the marketing year. For information and to view sample pages visit: Only active subscribers can read all of this article. If you are a subscriber, please log into the website. If you are not a subscriber, click here to subscribe to this edition of the STAT website and to learn more about becoming a subscriber.
The 20-Month Year website
