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September 8, 2005
![](covertulips61.FADE.jpg)
On the cover: Sun Valley Floral
Farms organic tulips. Photo by Amy Stewart.
by AMY STEWART
On a sunny afternoon in early June, a group
of florists, growers, scientists and journalists gathered in
a conference room on the second floor of San Francisco's Ferry
Building. They were there for a symposium on sustainable cut
flower production, but the main event was the announcement of
a new certification program -- a kind of eco-label for flowers
-- called Veriflora.
![photo of Tulips by Amy Stewart.](cover-Tulips59.jpg)
Above: Tulips. Photo by
Amy Stewart.
Jeff Stephens, communications director
for SCS (Scientific Certification Systems), the company that
runs the Veriflora program, described how the label would work.
Growers would have to pass an independent audit of their environmental
and social practices. Certified flowers could then be sold under
the Veriflora label to consumers who like to vote with their
dollars by purchasing fair trade coffee and other socially responsible
products.
At the end of his presentation, Stephens
made a comment that passed mostly unnoticed among the group.
"Just yesterday," he said, "we certified a major
California grower of lilies, irises and tulips."
I was in the room that day, and I knew
that he had to be talking about Sun Valley Floral Farms. After
the conference I pulled him aside, and, sure enough, he confirmed
that the ink on Sun Valley's certificate was barely dry.
This is no small matter. The Veriflora
standard, while still in draft form, is surprisingly ambitious
in its scope. Veriflora growers have to agree to use sustainable
agricultural practices, including reduced pesticide spraying
and conservation of water, and they must develop a plan to transition
each crop to organic production. By accepting the Veriflora certification,
Sun Valley was agreeing to wade even more deeply into the uncertain
waters of large-scale organic flower production.
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The Veriflora Standard
Protest on the Plaza
Where to buy organic and
eco-friendly flowers
The Veriflora
Standard
To read the complete Veriflora standard,
visit www.veriflora.com.
Here are the six core principles that the program is based upon:
- Advanced agricultural practices, including
organic methods and the using least toxic non-organic alternative
- Conservation of water resources to save
water and prevent runoff
- Conservation of ecological resources including
habitat restoration and buffer zones
- Waste management, including composting
and recycling
- Social responsibility, including worker
safety, hiring practices and wages
- Product quality, including keeping flowers
cold and hydrated for longer vase life
Putting
the Standard Into Practice
- Some of Sun Valley's practices that meet
or exceed the Veriflora standard include:
- Employer-paid health, dental and vision
insurance after one year of employment
- 401(k) plan with 50 percent company match
after one year
- English classes for immigrant workers
- Hydroponic growing practices that allow
water to be sterilized and re-used
- Organic methods such as crop rotation,
cover crops and beneficial insects
- Steam sterilization of soil in place of
chemical fumigants
- Sun Valley is exploring the use of whey
from Cypress Grove Chevre as a natural fertilizer
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Does this mean that Sun Valley's
Arcata farm will be organic overnight? No. But it does represent
a significant commitment to sustainable farming practices that
will lead to the use of more organic techniques over time. And
when such a major cut flower grower takes a stand like that,
the rest of the industry can't help but notice.
Eco-label for earth muffins
Although the Veriflora label
is aimed at consumers, there was not exactly a groundswell of
demand for it. A florist in Eugene, Ore., was quoted recently
in a floriculture trade journal as saying, "The bulk of
consumers already have an assumption that flowers are an organic
thing. We're 'earth muffins' here. We wear tie-dyed and I don't
have any customer requests (for organic flowers), almost ever."
If customers aren't asking for it, it won't just appear on its
own. And if you've ever tried calling a florist and asking for
organic or sustainable flowers to send to your mother on Mother's
Day -- well, good luck.
European
countries have had green-label programs for cut flowers for years,
but until recently, consumers in the United States haven't even
had the choice. That all changed when an upstart Internet company
called Organic Bouquet came along. The company's founder, Gerald
Prolman, was frustrated by the lack of organic flowers in the
mainstream cut flower market.
Left: Worker at
Sun Valley Floral Farms. Photo by Amy Stewart.
He approached a number of growers
about producing organic flowers to sell through OrganicBouquet.com.
He also bought flowers from Latin American farms that had been
certified through other country's programs. But he believed that
the U.S. needed a standard of its own. He organized a few industry
leaders, including Sun Valley president and CEO Lane DeVries,
to begin working on a certification program for cut flowers sold
in the United States.
'Not for the faint of heart'
Sun Valley's relationship with
Organic Bouquet began in 2001 when Prolman asked DeVries to grow
organic tulips for his company. "I wanted to try it,"
DeVries told me, "but let me tell you, it wasn't easy. Organic
tulips are not for the faint of heart."
Growing organic flowers on a
large scale presents a number of challenges. When a home gardener
loses flowers to disease, they snip off the ruined blossoms and
move on. But when acres of flowers succumb at once, it represents
a tremendous loss of money, time and land taken out of production
-- and that translates to a higher price tag for consumers.
And
because Sun Valley's flowers are headed for the mass market --
wholesalers, grocery stores and retail florists -- they have
to meet the exacting standards of that market. At farmers' markets,
people buy locally grown flowers precisely because they are ephemeral,
old-fashioned and perfumed. They're grown on a small scale, by
farmers down the road, often completely organically. If the bugs
make a few tiny nibbles on the leaves, nobody objects.
Right: Lane DeVries.
Photo by Amy Stewart.
But Sun Valley's flowers have
to compete in an entirely different marketplace. A grocery chain's
lily specifications might include the requirement that there
be five blossoms -- not four, not six -- on each stem. The flowers
have to survive long journeys by plane and truck, during which
they might not be in water at all. They have to arrive on time,
in perfect shape, day after day. Like it or not, in order for
organic produce to survive in the mass market, it has to live
up to the impossible, blemish-free ideal set by conventional
produce.
Also, the cut flower industry
is behind the curve when it comes to research on organic methods.
University agriculture departments conduct research into topics
like sustainable viticulture techniques and organic production
of strawberries and apples, but very little work has been done
on flowers. It's no surprise that other crops take precedence:
Resources are limited, flowers are only the eighth most valuable
commodity in California, and the priority is on food crops.
In spite of these obstacles,
Sun Valley took the plunge. Their organic tulips are planted
farther apart to prevent disease and fertilized with only natural
ingredients. They now grow a million organic tulips a year in
Arcata, and the program is expanding by 30 percent annually.
Next year, if you want to send organic tulips to your mother,
it'll be as easy as ordering them from Organic Bouquet.
'Why organic flowers? We
don't eat them.'
Prolman was initially dismayed
by the lack of interest in organic flowers among many in the
flower business. "The most common question I get asked,"
he said, "is 'Why organic flowers? We don't eat them.' But
this is about the Earth. It's good for the environment and it's
safer for workers."
Growers have a real incentive
to clean up their act: They are keenly aware that flowers are
a luxury. It only takes a little negative press to convince the
public to buy chocolates instead of roses on Valentine's Day.
Also, as more sophisticated organic methods are developed, the
cost will go down. The high price of agricultural chemicals,
many of which are petroleum-based and subject to fluctuations
in the price of oil, combined with the extensive worker protection
requirements and long re-entry times that keep workers out of
the greenhouses after spraying, are all compelling reasons for
even the most pragmatic grower to consider going green.
Although industry-designed certification
programs are automatically suspect -- will Veriflora simply be
a self-congratulatory award for doing little more than what the
law requires? -- the fact is that no one else came forward with
the resources or the vision.
And Prolman has plenty of vision.
"From a business standpoint," he said, "there
are 63 million educated and affluent consumers spending $230
billion annually on socially and environmentally responsible
products. These people want to do their part."
SCS, the company that administers
Veriflora, also conducts third-party certifications for the Forest
Stewardship Council, the Marine Stewardship Council and Starbucks'
sustainable coffee program, among others. In addition to Sun
Valley, their independent inspectors have certified two farms
in Ecuador and one other farm in California.
And the standard is still under
revision: Right now, the International Labor Rights Fund is reviewing
the labor provisions and may recommend changes. Dr. Margaret
Reeves, staff scientist for the Pesticide Action Network (PAN),
would like to see the list of prohibited chemicals expanded so
that all of PAN's "Bad Actors" -- pesticides with known
or probable acute toxicity -- are also banned, and eventually
she'd like to see only organic pesticides permitted. She'd also
like to see more assurances of accountability and transparency.
"But this is all about transition," she said. "We
take the industry where it is and we move in that direction.
I am all in favor of transition."
'One of the good guys'
Michael Keyes, the SCS auditor
who came to Sun Valley to conduct the inspections, told me that
the company did have to make some changes to comply. "We
found some chemicals in their warehouse that they couldn't have
under Veriflora," he told me. "Lane said he hadn't
used them for years, and I said, 'Great. Get rid of them.'"
Sun Valley provided third-party documentation that the banned
chemicals had been disposed of.
Left: DeVries addresses Sun Valley floral
Farm's entire crew. Photo by Amy Stewart.
Keyes also used underground
water monitoring devices called tensiometers to measure the flow
of water in Sun Valley's fields. "We're checking to make
sure they're not over-irrigating for two reasons," he said.
"First, it's a waste of water. Second, it's a kind of surrogate
measure for runoff. If there's water moving underground, there's
a risk of contamination of the waterways." The tests did
show over-irrigation in one field. Keyes said, "I told Lane
about it, and he said, 'You mean I'm spending more on irrigation
than I need to?' That put an end to it."
He also interviewed workers
regarding pay rates, safety protocols and other matters. (Keyes
speaks fluent Spanish, which is important when interviewing immigrant
workers.) He found no labor violations, although some workers
did report earning less than payroll records showed. "It
turned out that they just didn't understand the difference between
net and gross wages," he said. "It took a while to
straighten that out. But that's a misunderstanding, not a violation."
He also observed that, like
most agricultural enterprises, there are not many opportunities
to move up. "That's also not a violation of the standard,"
he said, "It's just an observation I shared with Lane. But
you know what? Sun Valley has more ways to measure efficiency
and productivity than anybody I've ever seen. Employees get evaluated
twice a year. When you do move up, it's because you've earned
it."
In fact, at the regular all-farm
meeting in Arcata last week, DeVries stood in front of the farm's
entire crew and reviewed, first in English and then in Spanish,
detailed numbers on productivity, recovery rate (the percentage
of flowers that are not lost or damaged during the harvest),
customer satisfaction, attendance and worker safety. Each team
(the hyacinth team, the freesia team and so forth) was rated
as a group, and prizes for innovative ideas and especially productive
or accident-free crews ranged from T-shirts and backpacks, to
a flat-screen TV and a Weber grill, to entry in their annual
drawing for a car.
Overall, Keyes was impressed
with Sun Valley's operation. (So far, only the Arcata farm has
been certified; the company also owns three other farms in California.)
"We'll keep monitoring," he said. "We'll do an
annual inspection, surprise inspections, and we'll residue test
their products. But really, Sun Valley's one of the good guys.
We need more growers like them."
Sun Valley is also monitored
for its pesticide use by the Humboldt County Agricultural Commissioner's
office. Paul Holzberger, who was interim agricultural commissioner
when I spoke to him last November, has conducted unannounced
inspections and audited their training and safety records. He
said, "They are probably the most complex agricultural operation
up here ... and they have an outstanding record of worker safety
and training. They are really a model farm."
A step in the right direction
DeVries said that he is looking forward
to pursuing the Veriflora certification at Sun Valley's other
farms. The transition is already underway company-wide, with
tests of new organic methods and an emphasis on the reduced use
of synthetic pesticides. Already only one or two workers at each
farm mix or apply the chemicals; they are highly trained and
monitored for health problems. "This [certification] is
good for my workers and good for the environment," DeVries
said. "Sometimes we have to use the chemicals to save the
crop. Look, I've got 400 families depending on me. But this is
the direction we're headed."
About Veriflora's emphasis on going organic
as the ultimate goal, he said, "When we sat around the table
[discussing Veriflora] and talked about going organic, the growers
said, 'If this is where we're going -- if we have to sign off
on going organic within XYZ timeframe -- it's not going to work.
If we make a pledge that we want to start heading in that direction,
that's quite a distinction.'"
He pointed to the significant reduction
in chemicals used on his gerbera daisy crop in Oxnard, where
beneficial insects take care of leaf miner pests. "The more
we can look at ways to use less and less chemicals -- and our
gerberas in Oxnard has proven that to us -- our crop is happy,
and our chemical bill is down. Will we ever get to the point
where we use none? I'm not sure if we can get there. But we'll
try as hard as we can. That's the commitment we make."
Still, DeVries acknowledges that the Veriflora
label will only gain traction if customers demand certified flowers,
and if they can find them when they go looking for them. After
all, he said, "It's a meaningless story if you can't go
get the flowers somewhere."
-- Amy Stewart is the Journal's garden
columnist and book critic. She is the author of two books: The Earth Moved: On the Remarkable Achievements
of Earthworms and From the Ground Up: The Story of a First
Garden.
Where to buy organic
and eco-friendly flowers
One of the best places to find organic
flowers is the farmers' market, where the flowers are fresh,
seasonal and grown with care by local farmers.
A few shops around town label their flowers
so that you can make a choice.
If you're sending flowers out of town,
you can buy organic, biodynamic, Veriflora and wildcrafted flowers
(and find definitions of those terms) at OrganicBouquet.com.
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Some of the photos accompanying this
story were taken at the North Coast Co-op Arcata store, where
flowers are often identified by grower and by how the flowers
were grown.
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Protest on the Plaza
Anyone who saw the protests against Sun
Valley during the Arcata Farmers' Market last summer might wonder
if the Veriflora inspectors went to the wrong farm. What about
the reports of worker abuse, improper use of toxic chemicals
and pollution of the waterways that were described in the "Poisons
and Sun Valley Floral Farms" brochure handed out to shoppers
every Saturday?
The Journal interviewed protestor Kim Starr
and was unable to verify or investigate the claims.
- While Starr reported that "hundreds"
of former Sun Valley workers, neighbors and other people told
her of alleged health problems and workplace abuses, she did
not have a written log of the conversations and was unable to
provide the name of a single person who would speak to a reporter,
even anonymously.
- Starr could not name any specific incidents,
with dates or other details, that could be investigated. She
said that she did not refer any of the people who confided in
her to an agency that could investigate or provide assistance.
- Interim Agricultural Commissioner Paul
Holzberger and Regional Water Quality Control Board senior engineering
geologist Tuck Vath confirmed that they had received no complaints
during the time period surrounding the protests. Vath described
Sun Valley's discharge as "zero to a very few parts per
billion," and Holzberger reported only a few violations
over the years which he described as "accidents and mistakes."
He had received no reports of worker pesticide illness in several
years. Sun Valley was last fined for a violation (over greenhouse
re-entry times) fifteen years ago.
- The brochure devoted an entire column
to methyl bromide, but Starr herself pointed out that Sun Valley
no longer uses the fumigant.
- Starr's list of chemicals that Sun Valley
used, which was festooned with skulls and crossbones, included
some organic products, some common household products like snail
bait, 18 chemicals that are not considered "Bad Actors"
by PAN (which could simply point to a lack of research on their
toxicity) and 21 that are "Bad Actors." Three of those
are banned under the Veriflora standard; others would require
very strict monitoring if Sun Valley continues to use them.
What did the protests accomplish? DeVries
said that his intention has always been to help draw people to
the market and contribute in a positive way; when he found out
that the congestion caused by the protest hurt sales of the growers
next to his booth, he withdrew. He said, "The last thing
I want to do is get in the way of someone earning a living."
Here's what some of the members of the North Coast Growers Association
had to say:
"We had meetings [with Starr] and
asked her to simply stand on the lawn. We were unable to get
any cooperation. If you feel you have a valid argument, why piss
people off trying to get your point across?" -- Midge
Catching, Catching Cactus & Succulents
"Sun Valley was very ethical and moral
in how they dealt with this. They've been wonderful. I really
respect Lane." -- Rita Jacinto, Flying Blue Dog Farm
"We've had a lot of requests for Sun
Valley to come back, and people wanting to know where they are.
We'd like them back." -- T Griffin, market manager
Sun Valley has not made a decision about
whether or not it will return to the market.
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