Rocky Ford Cantaloupes were pulled from store shelves in the summer of 2011
after reports that
people were getting sick. The illness was eventually
identified as listeria and traced to Jensen Farms in Holly. At least 30 people died, hundreds got sick. Now, the Colorado Department of Agriculture is the recipient of an Award
of Agricultural Marketing Excellence form the North American
Agricultural Marketing Officials conference for helping Rocky Ford
revitalize.
After trying to restore the brand, Rocky Ford has try their best to show their consumer that their cantaloupes are safe and knowing that people are not going to die from eating cantaloupes again.
"Farmers and ranchers strive to provide safe, nutritional food to their
own families and friends as well as the consumer," notes CDA chief John
Salazar. "This tragedy could have spelled the end for Rocky Ford
cantaloupe.
Some farmers who had raised melons for decades decided to stop growing
Rocky Fords this year. Only about a third of the land devoted to growing
the cantaloupes last year is now growing this year's crop, according to
the USDA's Farm Service Agency. "Quite a few people just dropped out," Knapp said. "They had no interest anymore in dealing with the risk." What the farmers did right was to restore their brand and having people to trust their brand again. But at the same time, there are farmers that are not willing to take the risk anymore. It was said that a lot of farmers that were growing cantaloupes were in the risk of their business and lost many too. At the end, they took responsibility and took time to figure out how and when to restore their brand.
Source:
1.http://farmprogress.com/story-big-effort-restore-colorados-rocky-ford-melons-wins-prize-9-101426
2. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/13/colorado-cantaloupes-retu_0_n_1670660.html
3. http://www.questia.com/library/1G1-320266603/rocky-ford-renaissance-colorado-cantaloupe-growers
No comments:
Post a Comment