IndexOpinion ....................... A6View Point .................. A7Life & Times ............... A8 Sports ................... B1-B5Arts & Events ....... B6-B8Time Out ..................... B9Vol. 103, No. 17, 52 pages

This weekIt was baby, baby, baby for one local mother. See life with triplets on A12.

Soccer action continues to heat up the fi elds. Check out B4.

Alf and Allan Peterson sit at the kitch-en table, an expanse of windows behind them framing row upon row of apple trees and, beyond, a spectacular view of Shuswap Lake.

For the Peterson family, and other or-chardists like them, their work has never been nine-to-fi ve, never just a job. Just as the apple trees make up an integral part of the family’s view day after day, they are also integral to the Petersons’ way of life. But that way of life is suffering from a chronic if not terminal illness.

The Petersons have been growing fruit on their Salmon Arm land since the 1920s. Mostly apples and cherries, but also some peaches, apricots, plums, pears and grapes. Financially, they’ve seen better times and bad times – but last year rated among the worst.

“To me, it’s as bad or worse than the Depression years,” says patriarch Alf.

Son Allan agrees: “This has been going on for a while. This was the worst this past year. It’s been steadily getting worse since 1994.”

A number of factors are contrib-uting to the plight of orchardists. Among them is the high Canadian

dollar, which makes B.C. fruit more expensive to importers. Another is an

infl ux of cheaper apples from Washing-ton State. Then there are store and con-sumer tastes. Never before have stores been more fussy, say the Petersons, ex-plaining that what was considered a good apple fi ve years ago might now be reject-ed. All the rage these days is a three-inch diameter apple, no smaller, no bigger, with no ‘fl aws.’

The prices growers get for their apples are going down, while consumers are pay-ing more. The Petersons grade their apples as much as they can during picking, but it’s impossible to catch everything, they ex-plain, not to mention that damage occurs beyond the gates of the orchard.

When an orchardist ships “culls,” as the sub-grade apples are called, to the packinghouse, the orchardist is charged for them. The culls go to Sun-Rype to make juice. Two years ago the cost was four cents per pound, this year seven

See High on page A14

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Cutting growers to the core

SALMON ARM

ObserverWednesdayMay 5, 2010

www.saobserver.net$1.05 GST INCLUDED

Special report: Martha Wickett looks at the state of the local fruit industry.

A14 THE SALMON ARM OBSERVER | Wednesday, May 5, 2010 | www.saobserver.net

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cents. That cost, in turn, reduces any return the orchardist gets from their best apples. Adding to the problem is an infl ux of juice from China.

When the packinghouse, Oka-nagan Tree Fruit Co-operative, sells fruit, the grower gets any-thing above the expenses of the packinghouse. The co-operative is the result of an amalgamation, in June 2008, of the operations of four grower-owned packing-houses, in an attempt to be more competitive. However, what the consumer eventually pays for apples doesn’t translate into profi t for the grower.

“If you go into the store now,

you’re paying more for apples than you ever have,” says Allan. “But we’re making the same as we did in the ’70s. So someone’s making money, but it’s not us.”

If you buy Okanagan apples from the larger stores like Safe-way or Overwaitea, it’s most likely that the apples have been shipped to the Coast and then shipped back, Alf says. Years ago growers used to be able to sell to all the stores, but no more.

“Now the produce manager in a store has no buying authority,” Allan adds. “I remember as a kid, we would haul apples to Over-waitea. Now with any of the big ones, one guy buys for all of west-ern Canada.”

Another issue for the Petersons

is the Agricultural Land Reserve. When the land freeze was intro-duced, the government declared it would guarantee the orchard-ist their cost of production, Allan says. But the help didn’t last.

“Different programs were sup-posed to offset losses. Some were all right, some are make-work projects for bureaucrats,” he says, adding that some of the newer ones are designed to benefi t peo-ple who least need them.

In other parts of the world ag-riculture is subsidized, he points out, but assistance for agriculture gets more meagre the farther west in Canada you go.

“We have the strictest rules for the preservation of farmland and the least rules for protection of

farmers,” says Allan. Alf points out that people are

also buying smaller quantities. “It used to be, customers never

bought less than a box of apples – about 35 pounds. Now people buy two pounds, three pounds,” he says.

Along with losses in apples, cherries have been challenging too.

Last year the Petersons had to quit picking as they weren’t sell-ing. Washington state had a glut of cherries so dumped them in B.C. and, because the Washington cherries are ready about a month earlier, there wasn’t much of a market for the B.C. fruit.

Allan recalls talking to a grow-er to the south who sold cherries

for 50 cents per pound last year, while they cost about 80 cents per pound to produce.

Over the past three years, wasps have also been taking their toll.

“Three days and your crop is gone,” says Alf.

Adds Allan: “This is a new spe-cies for here. They’re extremely destructive and there’s not a thing we can fi gure out to do with them.”

As for making a living in the future as an orchardist, it doesn’t look promising.

“Not unless something changes locally,” Allan says. “We’re too big. We have to sell through the packinghouse and unless they can get a decent price, we can’t make a living.”

High apple prices don’t benefi t growersEarly days: The Salmon Arm landscape is dominated by orchards in this circa 1912 Rex Lingford photo, courtesy of Salmon Arm Museum.

Continued from front

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Life and times of an appleStrict guidelines: Only a select few shapes, sizes, varieties make the grade.

It’s red, it’s round and it’s ready to be eaten. It’s an ordinary, orchard-variety apple.

Contrary to what meets the eye, however, the life and times of an apple grown in Salmon Arm can be fairly complex.

• First, there’s the weather. As orchardist James Hanna of

Hanna & Hanna Orchards points out, growing a good apple can be tricky.

The size of fruit is determined by the temperature within 21 days of blossom.

“If you have cold weather in those 21 days, you won’t get cell division, so the fruit size will be small,” he says. “It doesn’t matter what you do after the 21 days.”

The blossom usually occurs between the end of April and mid-May.

“So we’re hoping for 25-degree weather in May, nice rains in June and then a nice summer throughout July.”

A wet July doesn’t help the fruit, but moisture in August is good, he says.

Then, “dry weather in September throughout October, and cooling off at night. It’s got to cool off in the eve-nings in September and late August for the colour to develop.”

Laughing at his extensive list of weather wishes, he adds: “Then dry during the day so we can pick the fruit – and we’ll be good.”

• Once the fruit is grown and picked, it may be sold directly from the grower’s property, at a farmer’s market, sometimes sold directly to a retailer, or shipped to the Okanagan Tree Fruit Co-operative where the packinghouse stores, packages and ships to wholesalers and retailers.

When apples arrive at the fruit co-operative, they must participate in a fruity beauty pageant of sorts.

They are separated by size, colour and quality. Each variety has three to fi ve grades and each grade has 12 to 14 sizes.

The competition is stiff, the guidelines stringent. Too big, too small, blemished, wrong colour, etc., etc. can relegate an apple to the ‘cull’ category, never to see the light of a store’s produce display. Growers must pay for their culls, which are shipped to Sun-Rype for juice.

Indicating just how fussy the market can be, for the 2009 apple

crop handled by the Okanagan Tree Fruit Cooperative, just one variety, Ambrosia, was valued at above the cost of production.

At Peterson Bros. Orchards, the Petersons received an average of eight cents per pound for apples they shipped last year. Their cost to get their apples to the packinghouse was 22 cents per pound – so they oper-ated at a loss of 14 cents per pound.

See ‘Buying direct’ on pg. A16

By Martha WickettOBSERVER STAFF

When apples arrive at the fruit

co-operative, they must participate

in a fruity beauty pageant

of sorts.Expertise: Alf Peterson has been grow-ing fruit for decades.

JAMES MURRAY/OBSERVER

THE SALMON ARM OBSERVER | Wednesday, May 5, 2010 | www.saobserver.net A15

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Your mortgage options

• Fixed rate mortgages guarantee a set monthly payment amount at a locked-in interest rate for the term you choose, typically one to fi ve years. At the end of that period, you sign for another ‘term’ at the prevailing mortgage rates, which can be higher or lower.

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Studies have shown that, while a fi xed rate mortgage is still the most popular choice, choosing a variable rate mortgage over a fi xed rate mortgage can save on interest payments over the long term. But fi nancial experts agree that, when you’re mortgage shopping, it’s a mistake to look solely at interest rates. Your fi nancial and life circumstances can change – in fact, most mortgage holders look to make changes to their mortgage at least once or twice during their term – so you should also consider the ‘features’ of a mortgage, such as the fl exibility to make changes to it without incurring signifi cant costs. In particular you should ask the lender if a penalty will apply if you sell your house and purchase a new home with a new mortgage from the same lender.

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At one time, Salmon Arm and fruit-growing were synonymous.

The city became known for fruit growing as early as 1897, when a fruit growers’ organi-zation with 32 members was formed.

The industry has suf-fered ups and downs, one particularly devas-tating blow in the 1950s when a deep freeze knocked many orchard-ists out of production.

Still, for the tree fruit growers who remain, is there a solution to the problems that plague them, or must residents simply sit by and watch their demise?

At Peterson Bros., Alf Peterson notes their Laura’s Pies business has helped, because the family can grow variet-ies of fruit they don’t need to ship.

Helping orchardists also goes beyond eating local, say the Petersons.

“Not just eat local but support people who are growing local,” empha-sizes Allan, suggesting that people buy their fruit directly from local farms. “It’s all available right here. Most every-body sells off their prop-erty. A lot of us would have a lot less trouble if people would come and buy direct from us.”

At Hanna and Hanna Orchards, too, diversi-fi cation – such as their farm market and garden centre, orchard tours and education for lo-cal green thumbs – has been necessary.

James Hanna says a long-term solution would be supply man-agement, which, he points out, can be a political hot potato. He says the farm industries that are going well are supply managed, using tools such as marketing boards.

“So the Canadian consumer then uses all the Canadian apple supply and then, after it’s gone, we bring in (import) the other 50 per cent that’s required. That would make a tre-mendous difference.”

Adrian Abbott with BC Tree Fruits agrees.

“The only real solu-tion to bring real sta-bility to the situation would be some sort of regulated marketing environment,” he said, adding the key issue is that production of ap-ples worldwide contin-ues to increase despite declines in B.C.

“Consumption is fl at, but there continues to be more and more apples.”

Decisive help from government does not appear to be forthcom-ing.

B.C. Minister of Agri-

culture and Lands Steve Thomson, who was elected in the Kelowna-Mission riding, told the Observer he is aware of the challenges and dif-fi cult circumstances the industry is facing, and is trying to work out solu-tions.

“We continue to have constructive discussion with the fruit growers association...” he said. “We’re exploring all possible options we might be able to look at in terms of helping the sector.”

Regarding supply management, he says it would be federal juris-diction, but the provin-cial ministry has staff

available to work with the fruit growers as-sociation to see what may be possible in terms of inter-provin-cial and international

trade agreements. Hanna, however, says

the B.C. agriculture ministry has been off-loading responsibility for B.C.

“We used to have a district horticultural-ist and what all and would see them weekly. There’s no interest in agriculture now,” he said, adding that he un-derstands the govern-ment has to cut back somewhere.

Federally, Okanagan-Shuswap MP Colin Mayes told the Ob-server that Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz has been meeting with the fruit growers associa-tion, and Mayes hopes negotiations on a pack-age to provide a line of credit will go well.

He said the Govern-ment of Canada is not about to give subsidies to apple producers.

“If you do it for them, you can do it for any-one.”

Asked about auto-makers, Mayes said General Motors has paid back the cash it

received. Mayes, too, recom-

mends consumers buy direct from farm fruit stands or from sup-pliers like DeMille’s Farm Market.

Buying direct supports fruit growers

With care: Allan Peterson moves a box of apples at his North Broadview farm.

By Martha WickettOBSERVER STAFF

JAMES MURRAY/OBSERVER

A16 THE SALMON ARM OBSERVER | Wednesday, May 5, 2010 | www.saobserver.net

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